Visual Basic/VB, Printing via Crystal Report or Printer object??

Printing via Crystal Report or Printer object??

Author	Message
Scott #1 / 7	Printing via Crystal Report or Printer object?? I have a project that requires multiple rich-text regions on each page. My first attempts have centered around Crystal Reports - copying text from my on-screen preview to the Crystal Designer (version 7) report text objects. I can get the text copied over OK, but the font scaling is not what I expected. I have tried to dynamically scale the font size down, but get a message like "Method 'size' of object 'font' failed". Would it be easier/faster to: 1) keep fighting CRW until I get it to work 2) switch to a better (more dynamic) tool like ActiveReports 3) use the VB Printer object Any suggestions (especially tips on dumping multiple richtext regions to the printer object - since I suspect that will be my best alternative) will be most appreciated. Scott
Thu, 12 Sep 2002 03:00:00 GMT

Scott #2 / 7	Printing via Crystal Report or Printer object?? I hate to follow up on my own message, but in case anyone cares I ditched Crystal and went to ActiveReports. I was able to accomplish in a few hours what CRW couldn't do after more than a week. As another benefit, my installation package dropped 3!!! megabytes by making this one change - Partly because CR was going to force me to use a number of "template" reports to accomplish my goal. Also, I hear that CR8 will allow dynamic report creation, but they are requiring a run-time license for each copy you distribute. Is that true? If so, incredibly stupid. Scott Quote: > I have a project that requires multiple rich-text regions on each > page. My first attempts have centered around Crystal Reports - copying > text from my on-screen preview to the Crystal Designer (version 7) > report text objects. I can get the text copied over OK, but the font > scaling is not what I expected. I have tried to dynamically scale the > font size down, but get a message like "Method 'size' of object 'font' > failed". > Would it be easier/faster to: > 1) keep fighting CRW until I get it to work > 2) switch to a better (more dynamic) tool like ActiveReports > 3) use the VB Printer object > Any suggestions (especially tips on dumping multiple richtext regions > to the printer object - since I suspect that will be my best > alternative) will be most appreciated. > Scott
Sat, 14 Sep 2002 03:00:00 GMT

Jake Duckwort #3 / 7	Printing via Crystal Report or Printer object?? CR is the best tool. Try creating a report in Crystal and add a Formula Field to the report. Resize it to how you want it to be displayed. Now in your vb project pass the text through Crystals OCX to its formulas property for the report you just created. Pass it the name of the formula and the text. Active Reports isn't nearly as easy or dynamic as Crytal Reports. Whoever told you that was feeding you full of it. Quote: > I have a project that requires multiple rich-text regions on each > page. My first attempts have centered around Crystal Reports - copying > text from my on-screen preview to the Crystal Designer (version 7) > report text objects. I can get the text copied over OK, but the font > scaling is not what I expected. I have tried to dynamically scale the > font size down, but get a message like "Method 'size' of object 'font' > failed". > Would it be easier/faster to: > 1) keep fighting CRW until I get it to work > 2) switch to a better (more dynamic) tool like ActiveReports > 3) use the VB Printer object > Any suggestions (especially tips on dumping multiple richtext regions > to the printer object - since I suspect that will be my best > alternative) will be most appreciated. > Scott
Sun, 15 Sep 2002 03:00:00 GMT

Scott #4 / 7	Printing via Crystal Report or Printer object?? Thanks for the reply, I was starting to think I was talking to myself. Your ideas sound pretty cool. Here's the potential flaw - I have a varying number of fields, and once the text is inside the textbox, I need to (within reason) dynamically size the font to keep the whole box on a single page. CRW7 doesn't allow dynamic creation of controls on a page (AR does). CRW's textbox is missing many of the features I need to detect/control resizing the text. I've used CRW for many years, and I know it fairly well. After I posted the message, I downloaded the AR demo off the web and accomplished more in 6 hours with AR than in 2 weeks with CRW. I took CR out of my program, and the installation size shrunk by more than 3 megs. I only have to have one blank AR report to handle all of my layouts, where CRW seemed to require one for each major variation. The proof is in the project, and CRW (version 7) came up short. I've heard that CRW 8 has more "on the fly" control creation, but rumors say they want distribution royalties. Quote: > CR is the best tool. Try creating a report in Crystal and add a Formula > Field to the report. Resize it to how you want it to be displayed. Now in > your vb project pass the text through Crystals OCX to its formulas property > for the report you just created. Pass it the name of the formula and the > text. Active Reports isn't nearly as easy or dynamic as Crytal Reports. > Whoever told you that was feeding you full of it. > > I have a project that requires multiple rich-text regions on each > > page. My first attempts have centered around Crystal Reports - copying > > text from my on-screen preview to the Crystal Designer (version 7) > > report text objects. I can get the text copied over OK, but the font > > scaling is not what I expected. I have tried to dynamically scale the > > font size down, but get a message like "Method 'size' of object 'font' > > failed". > > Would it be easier/faster to: > > 1) keep fighting CRW until I get it to work > > 2) switch to a better (more dynamic) tool like ActiveReports > > 3) use the VB Printer object > > Any suggestions (especially tips on dumping multiple richtext regions > > to the printer object - since I suspect that will be my best > > alternative) will be most appreciated. > > Scott
Sun, 15 Sep 2002 03:00:00 GMT

chris petche #5 / 7	Printing via Crystal Report or Printer object?? I beg to differ. In my opinion, crystal reports (I struggled with CR7 for 6 months in a commercial environment) is massively inferior to ddActive Reports. The fact that CR is hugely Un VB ish in its format appearance, datahandling and design, with an awful kwerky front end designer. AR IS VB and so I can incorporate vb objects, methods, functions and variables into a vb environment. Simple things like setting a field with a negative value to have a Bold font is easy in AR but quite difficult in CR. (Yes I know there is conditional formatting in CR but you can't do font changes!) At the end of the day Data dynamics got our money (Seagate had already had our money, but now the box collects dust on the shelf) This is only my personal opinion, but shows that you are not writing for your own amu{filter}t Chris Quote: > CR is the best tool. Try creating a report in Crystal and add a Formula > Field to the report. Resize it to how you want it to be displayed. Now in > your vb project pass the text through Crystals OCX to its formulas property > for the report you just created. Pass it the name of the formula and the > text. Active Reports isn't nearly as easy or dynamic as Crytal Reports. > Whoever told you that was feeding you full of it. > > I have a project that requires multiple rich-text regions on each > > page. My first attempts have centered around Crystal Reports - copying > > text from my on-screen preview to the Crystal Designer (version 7) > > report text objects. I can get the text copied over OK, but the font > > scaling is not what I expected. I have tried to dynamically scale the > > font size down, but get a message like "Method 'size' of object 'font' > > failed". > > Would it be easier/faster to: > > 1) keep fighting CRW until I get it to work > > 2) switch to a better (more dynamic) tool like ActiveReports > > 3) use the VB Printer object > > Any suggestions (especially tips on dumping multiple richtext regions > > to the printer object - since I suspect that will be my best > > alternative) will be most appreciated. > > Scott
Mon, 16 Sep 2002 03:00:00 GMT

Kathleen Dollard-Joeri #6 / 7	Printing via Crystal Report or Printer object?? Scott, In addition to ActiveReports, you might want to take a look at Videosoft's VSView. -- Kathleen (MS-MVP) Reply in the newsgroup so everyone can benefit --
Mon, 16 Sep 2002 03:00:00 GMT

Jeff Koh #7 / 7	Printing via Crystal Report or Printer object?? Well, count me as another person who hates CR and loves ActiveReports. CR's report designer is truly pathetic; I can't believe how bad it is compared to Access. ActiveReport's designer has the look and feel of the Access reporting environment, and is much easier to use (not to mention it actually works). Crystal's formulas are a pain to work with; this is VB, why the hell should I learn some other proprietary language that doesn't even offer all the functionality of VBA? Also, ActiveReports uses VB events, and you can extend your report objects just like a class by adding properties and methods. Then your VB code can use the report objects just like any other class object, which makes for an extremely intuitive coding. Creating unbound reports is also very easy with ActiveReports. My last project used unbound reports that were actually bound to my custom business objects, and doing it with ActiveReports was a snap. Being able to write code like: Dim apps as New LoanApps 'My custom business object that implements a collection of Loan Applications Dim rpt as New LoanAppReport apps.Filter "Status = " & appPending apps.OrderBy "ApplicantName" Set rpt.LoanApps = apps rpt.PrintReport True is a big plus in my book. I haven't used CR since ver 6, but I'm pretty sure even with the latest version binding reports to VB objects would be considerably more work with CR than it is with ActiveReports. Jeff Quote: > CR is the best tool. Try creating a report in Crystal and add a Formula > Field to the report. Resize it to how you want it to be displayed. Now in > your vb project pass the text through Crystals OCX to its formulas property > for the report you just created. Pass it the name of the formula and the > text. Active Reports isn't nearly as easy or dynamic as Crytal Reports. > Whoever told you that was feeding you full of it. > > I have a project that requires multiple rich-text regions on each > > page. My first attempts have centered around Crystal Reports - copying > > text from my on-screen preview to the Crystal Designer (version 7) > > report text objects. I can get the text copied over OK, but the font > > scaling is not what I expected. I have tried to dynamically scale the > > font size down, but get a message like "Method 'size' of object 'font' > > failed". > > Would it be easier/faster to: > > 1) keep fighting CRW until I get it to work > > 2) switch to a better (more dynamic) tool like ActiveReports > > 3) use the VB Printer object > > Any suggestions (especially tips on dumping multiple richtext regions > > to the printer object - since I suspect that will be my best > > alternative) will be most appreciated. > > Scott
Tue, 17 Sep 2002 03:00:00 GMT

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