The idea of automating reports takes many shapes. Some
people may want to schedule a report before a weekly meeting and have the
report emailed to all meeting participants. When the report is scheduled and
emailed automatically, there is a great time savings for the end user, as well
as consistent quality of service. Usually, this automation is done through an
Enterprise Reporting Server solution, like Business Objects Enterprise Server
or Microsoft Reporting Services.
In the case of the Crystal
Alliance section of ASPAlliance, we have some unique needs for reporting. We
capture information in an XML file and must then put the information from the
XML file into an SQL Database. Then we use a Crystal XI report to create the
report. We have automated this process using a .NET an assembly.
A new wrinkle we have added is putting the report into Business
Objects Enterprise to schedule when the report is sent. This will help in
making sure these reports get sent out on time.
The intent of this article is not to provide a prepackaged
solution to be used in a similar environment. Hopefully, parts of this article
can be applied to other automation scenarios. The first part of this article
is concerned with getting the data in the appropriate place and the report.
The second part will involve setting up the Business objects Server correctly
and the subscriptions successfully.
System Requirements
Microsoft
Visual Studio 2005 (RTM)
.NET
Framework 2.0
Crystal
Reports XI
SQL
Server 2000
Crystal
Reports Server XI