User:RoyKok/sandbox
| File:Dream Report Development Studio.jpg Dream Report Development Studio | |
| Developer(s) | Ocean Data Systems |
|---|---|
| Initial release | 2006 |
| Written in | Easily Configurable - No Programming |
| Operating system | Windows |
| Available in | Chinese (Simplified), Chinese (Traditional), English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Spanish, Hebrew, Spanish, Russian, Portuguese |
| Type | Reporting software for industry |
| License | Trialware |
| Website | www |
Dream Report is a business intelligence application specifically developed for industry, currently marketed to discrete, hybrid and process industries by Ocean Data Systems ltd. It is used to design and generate and distribute reports from a wide range of data sources.[1]
Background
Report generation in industry differs greatly from report generation in business. The differences fall into several areas; connectivity to industrial data sources, analysis functions common to industry, ease of use - designed for process engineers, and 24x7x365 reliability. While report generators for industry can also be used for business reporting, business reporting tools are challenging to apply in industry as they require integration with additional solutions in order to meet industrial requirements.
Industrial requirements include:
Connectivity - Industrial data sources fall into three categories - real-time data, alarm data and history data. Industrial products typically support a combination of proprietary interfaces and automation industry standards. A reporting solution for industry will include support for these various interfaces in addition to the typical interfaces within business systems. Proprietary interfaces are typically enabled by industry vendor tool-kits. Industry interface standards include MODBUS, BACnet, OPC DA, OPC AE and OPC HDA. Business standards include OLE-DB, ODBC, CSV files, and Microsoft Excel workbooks.
Leading industrial data sources include Recorders, Programmable Logic Controllers (PLCs), Process Automation Controllers (PACs), Human Machine Interfaces (HMIs), Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition Systems (SCADA), Historians, Distributed Control Sytems (DCS), Manufacturing Execution systems (MES) and Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) systems.
Industrial analytics and reporting requirements will vary from business analytics. Needs will vary by market. In the pharmaceutical industry industry, reporting systems must offer support to meet the regulations of 21CFRPart11 (Book 21 of the Code of Federal Regulations, Part 11). This entails requirements to meet activity audit trails, report security and electronic signatures to capture user updates and actions. The Life Sciences industry also required specilized calculations for Chamber Validation and Lethality F0. In manufacturing, there are standard calculations to calculate run-times, Overall Equipment Efficiency (OEE), Down-time, Totalizations, and Energy Audits. In industries requiring heat treat chambers, there are common requirements for Thermal Uniformity Surveys (TUS). The support for these specializations are unique to report generators designed for industry.
The formatting of data into visual representations is also an area of differentiation. The industrial automation marketplace is dominated by products that are configurable and that require very little specialized knowledge in terms of training and operation. This requirement exists for two reasons; 1) automation systems are typically implemented and then transition into operation and are updated infrequently, and 2) users of these systems are typically process engineers - experts in the process that is being automated, and they benefit most from systems that exhibit a major focus on ease of use. For this reason, display objects are typically configured through menus rather than scripted or relying on programming languages.
Report delivery is also highly automated. Typical requirements include Printer redundancy (primary and backup printers), automatic report emailing, report distribution via File Transfer Protocol (FTP), and report display in Web Portals.
History
Crystal Services was combined with Holistic Systems to form the Information Management Group of Seagate Software, which later rebranded as Crystal Decisions and produced versions 4.0 through 9.0. Crystal Decisions was acquired in December 2003 by Business Objects, which produced versions 10, 11 (XI) and version 12 (2008). SAP acquired Business Objects on October 8, 2007 and released Crystal Reports 2011 (version 14) on May 3, 2011.
Several other applications, including Microsoft Visual Studio versions 2003 through 2008, at one time bundled an OEM version of Crystal Reports as a general purpose reporting tool.[2] Microsoft discontinued this practice and later released their own competitive reporting tool, SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS).[3] [verification needed] Crystal Reports for Visual Studio 2010 is still available as add-on software.
Versions and Editions
| Version | Release Date | Ownership | Editions* |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Crystal Services | ||
| 2 | Crystal Services | ||
| 3 | Crystal Services | ||
| 4 | Crystal Decisions | ||
| 5 | Crystal Decisions | ||
| 6 | Crystal Decisions | ||
| 7 | Crystal Decisions | ||
| 8 | Crystal Decisions | D,P,S | |
| 8.5 | Crystal Decisions | A,D,P,S | |
| 9 | Crystal Decisions | A,D,P,S | |
| 10 | Business Objects | A,D,P,S | |
| XI (11) | Business Objects | D,P,S | |
| 2008 (12) | Business Objects | D | |
| 2011 (14.0.x) | May 3, 2011 | SAP AG | |
| 2013 (14.1.x) | SAP AG |
- A=Advanced Developer, D=Developer, P=Professional, S=Standard [4]
Features
Report designer
Crystal Reports allows users to graphically design data connection(s) and report layout. In the Database Expert, users can select and link tables from a wide variety of data sources, including Microsoft Excel spreadsheets, Oracle databases, Microsoft SQL Server databases, Microsoft Access databases, Business Objects Enterprise business views, and local file system information. Fields from these tables can be placed on the report design surface, and can also be used in custom formulas, using either BASIC or Crystal's own syntax, which are then placed on the design surface. Formulas can be evaluated at several phases during report generation as specified by the developer.
Both fields and formulas have a wide array of formatting options available, which can be applied absolutely or conditionally. The data can be grouped into bands, each of which can be split further and conditionally suppressed as needed. Crystal Reports also supports subreports, graphing, and a limited amount of GIS functionality.
Supported data sources
- Databases such as PostgreSQL, Sybase, IBM DB2, Ingres, Microsoft Access, Microsoft SQL Server, MySQL, Interbase, Btrieve and Oracle
- Spreadsheets such as Microsoft Excel
- Text files
- XML Files
- Groupware applications as Lotus Notes, Microsoft Exchange and Novell GroupWise
- SAP: BW, Info Sets, Tables, and Business Objects Universes
Target audience
Crystal Reports came integrated with Visual Studio versions prior to 2010. Crystal Reports competes with several products in the Microsoft market, such as SQL Server Reporting Services, XtraReports, ActiveReports and List & Label. Crystal Reports is also accessible outside of the Microsoft market, for instance allowing Java developers to build applications with Crystal Reports components.
See also
References
- ^ Dream Report official site
- ^
Peck, George (2008). Crystal Reports 2008: The Complete Reference. McGraw-Hill Professional. p. 566. ISBN 978-0-07-159098-3. Retrieved 2009-07-09.
Not only was Crystal Reports bundled with earlier versions of Visual Basic..., but every Professional or higher version of VS.NET, up to and including Visual Studio 2008, includes an option to install Crystal Reports as well....
- ^ "Support for Crystal Reports for Visual Studio".
- ^ http://www.recrystallize.com/merchant/crystal-reports/Crystal_Reports_2008_version_comparison.pdf.
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Bibliography
- G. Taylor, Allen (June 3, 2008). Crystal Reports 2008 For Dummies (1st ed.). For Dummies. p. 396. ISBN 0-470-29077-3.
- Peck, George (June 19, 2008). Crystal Reports 2008: The Complete Reference (1st ed.). McGraw-Hill Osborne Media. p. 968. ISBN 0-07-159098-6.
- McCoy, Cate; Maric, Gord (2002). Mastering Crystal Reports 9 (1st ed.). Sybex. p. 639. ISBN 0-7821-4173-0.