May 14, 2010 at 12:17 pm
And Crystal you need to get a license for each client? I need to get the cobwebs out.
May 14, 2010 at 12:52 pm
I think we may be talking about 2 different things here - client-based reporting vs. server based reporting. Two different paradigms.
With MS Access even though you pull the mdb down from the network, the code executes on the client workstation where they must have MS Access (or runtime) installed.
SSRS runs as a Windows service on the SQL server. When a client requests a report, the report definition executes on the SQL server and is displayed as a web page in their browser. This may be an oversimplification, but pretty much all the client needs is a web browser to display the report.
You use the SQL Business Intelligence Design Studio (BIDS) included with the SQL product to design the reports. This generates an .rdl report definition file which you deploy to the server.
I believe Crystal has several versions to pick from. Crystal Enterprise is their equivalent of server based reporting, like SSRS, where you deploy the Crystal .rpt files to a web server. If you have a large user base, this one can get very expensive.
There is also Crystal for client based reports that can be called from .Net apps and works more like what you are familiar to in MS Access. Not sure what the licensing is here. You probably have to get a Developer version that allows redistribution of the necessary components with your client application. I don't do much .Net coding, so I'm not familiar with what is available in this regard.
May 14, 2010 at 1:46 pm
Are you talking about the price to pay for Crystal Enterprise itself or is there a fee or license that has to be paid for each user?
May 14, 2010 at 2:07 pm
Just for clarity sake - SSRS also has a mode where you can develop reports that are called by your application and run on the client system. This mode does not require any additional licensing costs - and does not require access to a web server to run the reports.
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May 14, 2010 at 2:15 pm
Both. I'm not sure what the current licensing model is, it's changed a few times over the past years. It used to be that you got 5 concurrent licenses in the base product. So 5 people at a time could have reports open in a browser. I remember having to put code into web pages to force the license to release, otherwise, if a user left the page up and went to get a cup of coffee, the license would be tied up until the sesson timed out and person #6 would get a message saying license unavailable. They may have addressed this issue in recent versions - I don't know. It is possible that 5 concurrent could support a few hundred users, depending on their usage pattern. But if it's a Monday morning report that a few dozen managers are looking at the start of their week, you may have an issue.
Now I believe the licensing is some combination of named user and concurrent user licenses, and I seem to recall that you have to buy them in packs of 10 at a time. I'm sure the SAP / Crystal web site has more details.
As I said earlier, I'm not bashing Crystal - it's a good product but you will pay more for it than for SSRS which is bundled with SQL Server.
May 14, 2010 at 4:54 pm
Nice to know. Thanks.
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