CrystalKiwi.com

Blog: December 2011

23 December: Season's Greetings

There is a busy week ahead with family and festive activities spread over the next few days.  Christmas Day is a Sunday this year, so in New Zealand the Monday and Tuesday are public holidays for everyone except the retail staff in the malls.

Best wishes to all our readers.

16 December: Grouping on Server

You can get major performance improvements by using the "Group on Server" option in your report.  There are a bunch of requirements you must have before the option is invoked, but if your report meets those, the summaries are processed on the database server and the group and summary fields are retrieved into the report.

This means the aggregation is performed closer to the source data, and less network traffic for the results.

However, we have just encountered another undocumented condition that stops grouping on server happening.

If your tables have memo fields (or any string field longer than 255 characters) and this field is displayed in a visible group section, then the aggregation isn't done on the server.  It looks like the Group By doesn't like memo fields.

A solution to this would be to create a view that converts the memo field into a more acceptable format, and then the group on server would work with the new view.

12 December: Excel as a Data Source

While Excel isn't an ideal data source, a lot of valuable data is stored in Excel files.  With Crystal Reports you can use an Excel Worksheet or named data range as a data source in your report.

You can use the worksheet as the main source for your report, or could extract the cells you want using a subreport.

But there is one small technicality you should be aware of.  You must use an xls (Excel 97-2003) file.  Office 2010 can save Excel data in a xls or xlsx file.  The default for Excel 2010 is the new xml based xlsx file which supports more rows and columns than the older xls format.

It is not difficult to open the newer format and saving as the older (as long as you have less than 32367 rows).  You just need to remember where your master copy of the data is stored.  But if you want that excel data in your crystal report the xls version is the only one Crystal Reports will recognize.

The export of any Crystal Report now supports export to Excel Worksheet (which is an xlsx file), but remember you can't use that data in another report.

5 December: Formatting Hint using Strikeout

I was working on a complex report and wanted to mark the items that needed attention next time I was on site.  There were some advanced formulas and running totals that needed checking before the report went into production.

A quick use of the Strikeout formatting option enabled me to indicate which objects to look at next time.  They were on the page but marked with strikeout so I would immediately see that the numbers needed further work.

4 December: Christchurch Visit

I was in Christchurch for business this week and had some time to catch up with friends for a drive around the city.  Offices and hotels I had visited in the past were a shattered skeleton and much of the streets are now protected by security fencing.  Photos here.

A massive earthquake hit Christchurch in November 2010.  After many aftershocks another big quake occurred in February 2011 with 181 fatalities. The locals have been cleaning up ever since but the damage is still evident everywhere you look.

I was in the suburb of Riccarton for the Christmas parade and was impressed how everyone if could enjoy the festive season.  A brief respite from the effort to rebuild the city.

2 December: More layout changes

Web sites with a style sheet are fairly common practice now, but there is one special type of HTML file that needs a little more care.

These blog pages are emailed out, so the style sheet has to work both as a web server based page, and as a file attachment on an email message.  Embedded styles seems a solution that works with both delivery methods.

I am heading to Christchurch this coming weekend, so will take the camera along to get some pictures of the red zone in the central city.