The Finals: MS Reporting Services vs XtraReports
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Nope any valid connection can be used to supply the data. You have to have SQL Server to install SSRS as the supporting database can ONLY be SQL Server. Data used in the report can come from any valid source.
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity RAH
But SQL Server would still have to exist and be installed to use SSRS in all circumstances?
Need custom software developed? I do C# development and consulting all over the United States. A man said to the universe: "Sir I exist!" "However," replied the universe, "The fact has not created in me A sense of obligation." --Stephen Crane
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Christopher Duncan wrote:
So, before I dig in and start investing time in a particular platform, I thought I'd just ask the obvious question. Anyone know of $350 worth of reasons why XtraReports would be a better way to go than SSRS?
- Support. DevExpress will even write you a small app. for you to show you how to do what you want to do. 2) Portability. What happens when Applied Innovations is bought by a bigger host who doesn't support SSRS? Or the make a fundamental change to their services that doesn't support other things you require? This has recently happened to me with a fairly large host - I'm in the process of moving to a different one right now. 3) I've yet to find a free product that was really worth it. In this case, if free costs me more than 6 hours of time compared to option B, it's really more expensive than $350. Cheers, Drew.
Dev Express support is *superb*. The best I have ever had from a 3rd paty tool vendor bar none. I.e. actually stays with you to solve the problem. $350 is *nothing*, really. It's less than a day of a competent developer's time.
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Doesn't SSRS require the data to be from SQL Server? and the reports to be generated from SQL Server?
Need custom software developed? I do C# development and consulting all over the United States. A man said to the universe: "Sir I exist!" "However," replied the universe, "The fact has not created in me A sense of obligation." --Stephen Crane
No SSRS does not require the data to be from SQL Server. I am using reporting services on my site and all data is loaded via List, which means from anywhere.
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I'm not sure which is detested more on this site. VB or Crystal...
I didn't get any requirements for the signature
Whatever the popular thing to detest is on this site, the fact remains that SSRS is at least a decade behind Crystal reports in terms of its capabilities as a report designer. Deployment is not free with SSRS either. SSRS in my opinion (these are all my opinions of course) runs best as an Intranet application where you have active directory going, single sign-ons, and very very simple reports. I remember the report designer.. I think it was Access 1.1 or 2. SSRS's designer is not much better, if. caveat is, I am familiar with ssrs on sql 2005 and have only read about sql2008's ssrs report designer yet. I am ever hopeful that someone at SAP/BO/Crystal will decide to make it easier to deploy crystal on a shared hosting environment (but not holding my breath).
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Whatever the popular thing to detest is on this site, the fact remains that SSRS is at least a decade behind Crystal reports in terms of its capabilities as a report designer. Deployment is not free with SSRS either. SSRS in my opinion (these are all my opinions of course) runs best as an Intranet application where you have active directory going, single sign-ons, and very very simple reports. I remember the report designer.. I think it was Access 1.1 or 2. SSRS's designer is not much better, if. caveat is, I am familiar with ssrs on sql 2005 and have only read about sql2008's ssrs report designer yet. I am ever hopeful that someone at SAP/BO/Crystal will decide to make it easier to deploy crystal on a shared hosting environment (but not holding my breath).
I worked with Crystal for 5 years and the company I worked for was trying to switch to SSRS because it was free. But we only had a few developer licenses so they weren't saving much. I left that job to get a nice raise, but I couldn't deal with the SSRS designer. The Crystal designer is very good. I don't know why everyone hates it.
I didn't get any requirements for the signature
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Dev Express support is *superb*. The best I have ever had from a 3rd paty tool vendor bar none. I.e. actually stays with you to solve the problem. $350 is *nothing*, really. It's less than a day of a competent developer's time.
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After a little poking around and a lot of help from my friends here, I've come down to two paths. Turns out my hosting company "doesn't support Crystal reports," i.e. if you wanna use that tool, you need stuff installed / configured on the host server. I was happy to hear their response as it validated my assumptions that this particular dog just won't hunt, and perhaps that I'm not quite as stupid as I thought I was (though the jury is still out on that). What my hosting folks (enthusiastic endorsement: Applied Innovations[^]) do support is Sql Server 2005 Reporting Services (SSRS), which they provide for free. Sometimes Free is actually cheaper than Not Free, so I thought I'd give it a try. Looks like all the basics are there. In the Not Free category, I downloaded the eval of XtraReports after hearing good things from many of you. It seems like a quality product and also gets the job done for my web reporting needs. That said, in this particular case $350 appears to be exactly $350 more than Free, which makes me lean towards SSRS. So, before I dig in and start investing time in a particular platform, I thought I'd just ask the obvious question. Anyone know of $350 worth of reasons why XtraReports would be a better way to go than SSRS?
Christopher Duncan Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes www.PracticalUSA.com
Just point out something that might be obvious, MS Reporting Services is not the same as MS Report Viewer. Report Viewer is a client only component where you provide the data (however you get it) and a report definition (.rdl). Reporting Services needs SQL Server (and the RS add on).
Luis Alonso Ramos Intelectix Chihuahua, Mexico My Blog!
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Whatever the popular thing to detest is on this site, the fact remains that SSRS is at least a decade behind Crystal reports in terms of its capabilities as a report designer. Deployment is not free with SSRS either. SSRS in my opinion (these are all my opinions of course) runs best as an Intranet application where you have active directory going, single sign-ons, and very very simple reports. I remember the report designer.. I think it was Access 1.1 or 2. SSRS's designer is not much better, if. caveat is, I am familiar with ssrs on sql 2005 and have only read about sql2008's ssrs report designer yet. I am ever hopeful that someone at SAP/BO/Crystal will decide to make it easier to deploy crystal on a shared hosting environment (but not holding my breath).
Michael Abramovitch wrote:
I am familiar with ssrs on sql 2005 and have only read about sql2008's ssrs report designer yet.
SQL2008's report designer is MUCH improved over SQL2005's. They've also reworked a number of things on the back end to make it faster and more scalable. If your opinion of SSRS is based on an earlier version, you should take another look at it. My company has been talking about moving from Crystal Reports for a few years, but is now moving to SSRS2008. Yeah, it still has its quirks, but what doesn't? It only seems to be getting better with age. Ed
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But SQL Server would still have to exist and be installed to use SSRS in all circumstances?
Need custom software developed? I do C# development and consulting all over the United States. A man said to the universe: "Sir I exist!" "However," replied the universe, "The fact has not created in me A sense of obligation." --Stephen Crane
True, is is called SSRS after all, it would be a bit much not to expect them to include their product in the mix.
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity RAH
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You can even get around that to some degree. You can use the report viewer control on your ASP.NET page and run the reports in local mode. It doesn't require SQL Server, and the report runs off of DataSets, so you can use any data source. You just have to go through the extra step of creating the DataSet first. The local mode reports have extra limitations, but they cover our needs easily.
I've always wondered if that was possible, we have the whole thing installed so have not needed to investigate this. As all reports are serviced by stored procs imposing a dataset would be simple! Amusingly some of the procs were originally written to service Crystal reports.
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity RAH
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Nope any valid connection can be used to supply the data. You have to have SQL Server to install SSRS as the supporting database can ONLY be SQL Server. Data used in the report can come from any valid source.
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity RAH
Nope not at all. I've worked on apps where we have embedded the SSRS rendering engine in the client, and we've loaded the RDL from a file and chucked a dataset at it. No database at all client side, no instance of SSRS server side for the client to talk to. I'm not sure of the licensing implications of doing this though. IMHO SSRS is a better product than crystal reports 95% of the time. Yes crystal has some extra features that SSRS can't do, but I've done things in SSRS with a minimum of fuss that I don't know if crystal can do at all. If lock-in is your concern you should be more wary of crystal than SSRS.
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Nope not at all. I've worked on apps where we have embedded the SSRS rendering engine in the client, and we've loaded the RDL from a file and chucked a dataset at it. No database at all client side, no instance of SSRS server side for the client to talk to. I'm not sure of the licensing implications of doing this though. IMHO SSRS is a better product than crystal reports 95% of the time. Yes crystal has some extra features that SSRS can't do, but I've done things in SSRS with a minimum of fuss that I don't know if crystal can do at all. If lock-in is your concern you should be more wary of crystal than SSRS.
I'd have to argue with you about 5%. CR has so many issues that any possible advantage is completely swamped by the crap in there. One of the most satisfying decisions I made was to move from CR to SSRS (4 years ago).
Never underestimate the power of human stupidity RAH
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Well, I'm not locked to SSRS as I can buy most any of the reporting solutions out there. The only limitation is that I can't use Crystal. Having worked with it a bit, that's not really a heartbreaker. Is there a down side to SSRS that I'm overlooking?
Christopher Duncan Author of The Career Programmer and Unite the Tribes www.PracticalUSA.com
If you've used Crystal before then you'll quickly realize that SSRS doesn't provide much. XtraReports is much more flexible and you've got the code too.
ed ~"Watch your thoughts; they become your words. Watch your words they become your actions. Watch your actions; they become your habits. Watch your habits; they become your character. Watch your character; it becomes your destiny." -Frank Outlaw.