Millet Software has just released version 6.5 of Visual Cut, one of my favorite tools for automating Crystal Reports.  There are about 50 fixes and new features but the one that stood out was the ability to export to XLSX format.  This format supports more than a million rows in a single tab and consumes much less disk space.

Another handy new feature, pointed out by Jared Faulkner of JF Electric , is the “After_Success_SQL” command that allows you to run a SQL statement after a completed report, or for each group in a burst. This gives you the ability to update the database with tracking information for each e-mailed or exported item. Doing this before required having the CUT Light UFL (also by Millet Software) but now this is built into Visual Cut.

If you want to learn more about Visual Cut or one of the other similar tools, then you should read my annual review of Desktop Schedulers.  The review is done each March so it will be updated next month.

The folks at ReCrystallize have recently released version 14 of ReCrystallize Pro.  For those of you who are not familiar with ReCrystallize, it is a low cost way to put your reports on the web.  Walk through a wizard and ReCrystallize will generate ASP or ASP.NET web pages that are designed to run your reports.  You can read more about it in my comparison of server based deployment options.  With version 14 there are two significant changes.

1) It now supports the newest version of Crystal Reports (2011). This means you can do dynamic and cascading parameters and you can change parameter values without changing web pages or in some cases without even refreshing the report.

2) It now supports ASP.Net which means it works better with the current browsers and current versions of Windows and IIS.  It also means that the user’s browser doesn’t need to download anything.

Note that they still support classic ASP and most older versions of CR.  See their web site for more details.

One of my readers wrote in today to tell me that SAP released Service Pack 4 a few months ago.   He had CR 2008 set to “Check for Updates on Startup” but it  never triggered an update for SP4.  Even after he manually clicked on “Check for Updates” the message said that he had the most recent version.  But when he searched the SAP website he found it.  

I have been holding at SP2 because of two issues that  I wrote about earlier.  But when I asked CR to check for updates I got the same message – that I had the most recent version.  So searched the download site and found SP4 in the “Downloads” area of the SAP web site.  I installed it and it didn’t break my dynamic parameters, so that is good news.  The “Saved Data” issue was intermittent so I will be on the lookout for that or any new problems.

And thanks to Mark Edwards at DataReport Consulting for pointing this out.

I am working on my annual review of Crystal Reports viewer programs and will be adding a few new ones to the matrix this year.  One of the “new” ones I will be adding is Report Runner Viewer by Jeff-Net.   Even though this is the first time RRV has been in the review it is not really a ‘new’ viewer.  RRV has been around 9 years and has a considerable install base, so it is great to finally have their information included.

But what IS new is that they are offering the first copy of the viewer for free to any company that wants to try it.   Additional copies are $50 plus a $4 per user annual renewal fee.  The renewal fee covers 24x7x65 support.

The site also offers a free 90-day evaluation, which seems redundant when the first copy is free. But to get the free license you have to use a company EMail address (not gmail,  hotmail, etc).  The other thing that might confuse you is that this offer is on the front page of the Jeff-Net site, but is not mentioned on the RRV product page.   So it is some type of special promotion.   No guarantee how long it will last, so if you want to try a new viewer program you can get a free copy of Jeff-Net’s Report Runner Viewer.

And when you do, please let me know what you think of it.

Millet Software has just released a new version of their DataLink Viewer using the runtime engine for Crystal Reports 2011. As far as I know this is the first third-party viewer to incorporate the newest runtime engine. With this version of DLV you can export to 2 new file formats supported by CR 2011:

XLSX – which allows you to export more than the 65,000 rows available in a classic XLS file.

RPTR- which allows you to deploy a report that users can run, without giving them the ability to open or edit the RPT in Crystal reports.

You can request a free trial of DataLink Viewer by sending an Email message to: dlv@kenhamady.com

PC World has a pretty good article describing the soon-to-be-released Crystal Server 2011 and BO Edge 4.0.  It is always nice to see someone write an article that includes product pricing.

SAP is positioning these products for small to medium sized businesses.  The idea is that when they grow the can seamlessly upgrade to the full BO Enterprise product line.  According to the article, that is why Crystal Reports Server no longer has the word “Reports” in the name.  It is seen as an entry level BI platform and more than just “reporting”.

Techtarget.com also has an article with a slightly different emphasis.

I have written several posts regarding Zebra printers and the problems they have had with labels that rotate when they shouldn’t.  I read that this was fixed in CR 2008 with a recent service pack, but it isn’t clear if this was fixed for CR XI.   I just learned that Seagull Scientific provides free printer drivers for many zebra printers (and others).  These do not seem to have the problems with rotation that have been described, so that is another potential solution for some of you.

I recently wrote about the disappearance from SAP’s website of most of the prior versions of CR, leaving only CR 2008 and CR 2011.  I am happy to report that version XI is now again available for sale.

What I didn’t notice at the time was that the XI maintenance releases were also taken down for both XIr1 and XIr2.  These have now been replaced by a single maintenance release called XIr2A.   You can read about this on the SAP Blog.  The impression that you get is that they are simply trying to consolidate the updates.  However, the update probably reflects whatever changes were required to deal with the ‘open source issues’ that forced SAP to discontinue the older versions.  If anyone gets more details on what the ‘open source issue’ is please let me know.

And thanks to David Hopaluk at Here2Help Solutions for pointing out the restored maintenance releases.

If you were considering purchasing cViewMANAGER then you might want to do it soon.  They have dropped the price from $599 to $399 for a limited time.  If you are not familiar with cViewMANAGER you can read about it in my comparison page for scheduling and Emailing  engines.

Ido Millet of Millet Software has added another powerful feature to an already feature rich product called Visual Cut.  Users now have the ability to automatically generate an Excel Pivot Table based on an exported (Data Only) excel worksheet.  If you use pivot tables then you might want to see this feature in action.  Ido has produced a video that shows how it works.

If you want to compare the features of Visual Cut to similar products you can read my comparison.

Or, you can try Visual Cut for free by sending an Email request.  Millet Software will respond with a download link and instructions.  Please let them know that you have read about Visual Cut in my Blog.