Distributing Crystal Report outside of Crystal Enterprise

[jenschmidt]

Hi all! My organization is looking for a way to distribute a simple report to about 900 end-users. Based on the price tag of a license to view reports via the web, we'd like to avoid having them go that route. I know there are many 3rd party distribution programs that would allow us to distribute the reports and was wondering if you guys could give me some insight as to what are the best programs out there. Distribution formats could range anywhere from pdf to rpt to excel, and distribution methods could be email or other electronic way.

The basic rules we need to follow are: 1. least manual intervention possible, 2. most cost effective possible

Thanks very much!
Jen jennifer.giemza@uwmf.wisc.edu

 

[pelajhia]

How often does the report need to be distributed?

 

[jenschmidt]

Distributed monthly jennifer.giemza@uwmf.wisc.edu

 

[chelseatech]

Hi jennifer download the eval of cViewMANAGER from my web site at

http://www.chelseatech.net/download.htm

It will schedule and email reports. Editor and Publisher of Crystal Clear

http://www.chelseatech.co.nz/pubs.htm

 

[rhinok]

If you're automatically scheduling and distributing Crystal Reports (even one report) to ~900 Users per month then you'll probably need a Broadcast License, regardless of the distribution tool. MSRP for a broadcast license is $45K.

900 Users is not small user base. If you ever want to distribute more than one report, especially in different formats, then Crystal Enterprise may be a worthy investment.

 

[IdoMillet]

If the monthly distribution is of the WHOLE report, you could simply export and e-mail to a distribution list manually.

If the need is to automatically burst the report so each user gets their portion as an exported file attached to an e-mail, my "Visual CUT" application (as well as the "CUT" UFL) application can do this.

However, you would need to use the Manual Mode (open the report in Visual CUT each month and click the SEND button) instead of the Scheduled Mode (Invoking Visual CUT via the Windows Scheduler). This is because, if you don't purchase a Broadcase License, distribution to more than 50 recipients requires some manual element in the process (it can't be fully automated).

You can see a video of how Visual CUT works in Manual Mode at:

http://www.milletsoftware.com/Visual_CUT.htm

Cheers,
- Ido CUT, Visual CUT, and DataLink Viewer:
view, e-mail, export, burst, distribute, and schedule Crystal Reports.

http://www.MilletSoftware.com

 

[jenschmidt]

ChelseaTech - I did download the cViewMANAGER. I can see where you can email a report to one person, but can it email the report to 900 email addresses? Also, can we set the report on a recurring schedule so that on the fifth day of every month, it runs the report for the LastFullMonth and then distributes the report - all automatically or would there be manual intervention during any of those steps?

Thanks so much for your help!
Jen jennifer.giemza@uwmf.wisc.edu