-----Original Message-----
From: Tony Blomfield <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: Multiple recipients of list delphi <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Date: Thursday, March 11, 1999 10:15 PM
Subject: Re: [DUG]: Delphi and Crystal on NT4
developer tool its second to none in my opinion. Crystal Reports and big
sister Crystal Info/Crystal Info SDK can do virtually anything. The next
version will probably have VBA scripting chucked in as well. Stick with it.
>The most likely cause is a missing DLL, I think. Would you agree?
>
You sound like an expert on Crystal, so as a novice permit me to ask one
question.
>>Firstly, in my limited expereience with Crystal, I found it a very dull
>>product with little to reccomend it.
This is best as a client server tool. Record set processing is best done
on/in the server. *Parameterized stored procedures are the only sane way to
work with CR.* Thus you need to do backend development in T-SQL, PL/SQL etc
as well. Your issue about the 'dumb SQL approach' afflicts a lot of software
products that use client originating SQL. It's not necessarily only a
Crystal Reports issue. CR7 does now sort, group and do other operations on
the server when you issue SQL from the client. Earlier versions, could, if
you let them, fill your hard disk with temporary data, and tie up you
network as it replicated the server tables on your local machine!!
If you need simple report writing and QR can do the task (hey I use it too,
where it suits) you don't need CR. In fact you would make extra work for
yourself. Crystal Reports also makes a lousy end user tool in my opinion.
You would have more joy with MS Access.
Crystal Reports fits into different needs and different niches. There is no
one triumphant report writer for all times and all places.
Crystal Reports is not primarily a Delphi tool. It has elements in version 7
that make sense only in a Visual Studio environment or the specifically VB
design time ActiveX report designer control. It is also tuned for SQL Server
BackOffice and Microsoft OLAP on the server side. But it has Web report
rendering controls, Java Beans suppport, MapInfo integration, C++ classes
etc. A pure Delphi only development team would probably find better tools,
with source, like RB PRO.
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