Pro VS 2005 Reporting using SQL Server and Crystal Reports (Pro)

Features

• Cover Type: Paperback with 528 pages
• Published by: Apress
• Edition: 1st Edition November 17, 2006
• Written in: English
• ISBN 10 Number: 1590596889
• ISBN 13 Number: 978-1590596883
• Book Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.9 x 1.3 inches
• Weighs: 1.9 pounds

Product Description


Pro VS 2005 Reporting Using SQL Server and Crystal Reports offers a proven methodology for building reporting solutions. The authors focus on SQL Server 2005 and Crystal Reports, but also cover other popular technologies like Oracle and ActiveReports, to give you a thorough grounding in the reporting field. The book presents the requirements for a real-world reporting application in a distributed environment, and covers all the phases of development. Youll learn to

• Define report content, format, definitions, and rules.
• Establish data requirements.
• Build and test stored procedures.
• Construct a data access layer in .NET.
• Account for different architectures using XML web services and .NET Remoting.
• Design the reports using Crystal Reports.
• Develop a Windows Forms client application to allow users to launch reports and set report options.
• Export report output to other sources such as PowerPoint.

In many business applications, reports play a critical role. The stakeholders of a software system expect reports to summarize data and efficiently present it to business users and decision markers. They expect reports to present data in ways they can easily interpret, and in ways that help them evaluate and analyze business performance. Visual Studio 2005, SQL Server 2005, and Crystal Reports contain powerful capabilities to help you build and deliver sophisticated presentation output. This is the only book available that shows you how to use all these disparate technologies together to create a cohesive solution.

About The Author
Kevin S. Goff is the author of CoDe magazine's The Baker's Dozen series. He selects a development topic each month and writes 13 productivity tips. Most topics cover .NET in some manner. In late 2004, he wrote an article on productivity tips for Crystal Reports in .NET, a subject close to his heart. The article discussed reporting for line-of-business applications, and focused on producing efficient, effective results. The article caught the attention of many people and organizations, and he's been talking to people and building up the ideas for this book ever since.

Rod Paddock is the editor of CoDe magazine. CoDe is well known in the development community, and is on an aggressive path to grow into being the number one Microsoft development community magazine resource.

Reader Reviews
Perhaps some more advanced users will find it helpful. It was not helpful to me because it contains one big example. There are several drawbacks to this approach. Among them are that the explanations all relate to the example and are therefore incomplete. Another drawback is you are stuck reading the book from beginning to end pretty much. I keep trying to use the book, but it is inadequate for my needs, even after reading it cover-to-cover. I recently tried to find information on Section Expert. This important element of VS Crystal Reports does not occur in the contents or index of the book. The one contents listing for sections explains how to use Section Expert for the example case. This left out a description of more than half of the options available. The book is obtuse in that it is a cascade of information without an overarching vision. It's not until page 169 that it presents a diagram that shows a system overview. The rest is a lot of details: point here, click there, without a clear explanation of the mission. WHY am I creating Strongly Type Datasets, what are the alternatives and where in the whole process does this fit in? There is no explanation of the .Designer.cs file that Visual Studio generates. It seems that is essential for populating the report, as it is the report object. You can't jump in anywhere, as it presents an entire system from the ground up. And it starts at the bottom in the stored procedures in the database and slogs through to the reporting, when it would have benefited greatly from some simpler complete examples, or even the same one, slimmed down to one chapter and then expanded throughout the book. It also inexplicably devotes chapters to other report engines, when the title contains "Crystal Reports". And it discusses advanced techniques before it has covered all of the basics. It also, like many, many other computer texts, makes no allowance for maintenance projects. It assumes you are starting out from scratch. Great if you've got that kind of job, but they are extremely rare. More typical is coming into a project or system that has already been build and being asked to maintain or enhance it. This book is worthless for that since it lacks: 1) A roadmap or overview of the possible technologies 2) Reference material or a way to skip around to what you need. If you are looking for a purely academic book, that you can read in the course of a semester and learn things just one way, this is it.