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"CONSULTING If you're not a part of the solution, there's good money to be made in prolonging the problem." -- Despair dot com
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truth, sort of. I'm a one man shop, and when customers go down, it's personal. 
Charlie Gilley
“They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
Has never been more appropriate.
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I roll my own.
When I was first starting to learn C# (wow, was that really twenty years ago?) one project used ActiveReports and it was awful -- it may have improved since.
A few years later I had to write a subsystem which could execute (previously defined) Crystal Reports (and provide values to any required parameters) -- which I hope I never have to do again.
One of my main peeves with "reports" is that all too often someone walks into the office with a scruffy sheet of paper and says something like, "Joe used to run this report for me at the start of every month, but he's gone now, can you run it for me?" To which the only answer is "no". Even provided a soft-copy, no, I can't, I have no idea how it was generated.
To wit -- the output does not contain the original input.
So, what I chose to do for an employer about fifteen years ago was to define my own simple report engine. The report definition is in XML -- it basically only supports executing one SQL SELECT statement against a database, which was "good enough". The output is the same XML with the result data included (plus parameter values and such).
So then, given a soft-copy of a report, I can feed it in as the input and re-run it -- providing new parameter values as required.
The process then allows the recipient to view the report with either Excel or a Web Browser by using XSLT to transform the XML to either CSV or XHTML. Slick as snot.
What's the next worst peeve about "reports" (in PDF or whatever)? Having a middle-manager bring one (a soft-copy I hope) to you and say, "we need you to load this data into our analysis database so we can analyze it". FFS! It came from a database; just get the raw data! Nope, they're not allowed access to the database. 
Well, given one of my reports, they have the data in XML or CSV, so it's not that difficult to ETL into whatever analysis database they choose.
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I have looked at report generators since the 80's and concluded long ago they aint worth the hassle, because they rarely give you exactly what you want, and from a customer point of view they are difficult to use with no-one wanting to take responsibility for learning them, and even if they do when that person leaves it's back to square one. When designing a solution i try make my reports give all the options i can think, and usually also have a 'dump to csv' checkbox, so as well as producing a pdf, it will create a file the customer can manipulate themselves in excel. If there's really something in there not initially discussed or wanted later as needs change, i quote and charge, unless it's a quick mod to filter data in a certain way as a one off and takes me less than an hour, which i do as part of the support contract.
GL
Bob
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I've used Crystal Reports Writer (CRW) and ReportBuilder (http://www.digital-metaphors.com/products). ReportBuilder was almost as powerful as CRW, but I found it harder to use. Though I admit this could have just been because I am very experienced with CRW.
We have WinForms DevExpress, but have never used it for reporting. I find DevExpress to have so many options, that interact with each other in so many mysterious ways, that it is hard to configure everything correctly.
I like CRW. I find it simple to use, and I can quickly spit out almost any report that has been asked for. Caveats:
1. This is Windows desktop development only.
2. All reports are effectively client-side only. The data is retrieved from the server, but the report is local.
3. We have a standard (to us) library that displays CRW reports. We just pass in the path to the RPT file and the parameters. The library displays the report with all the UI options.
4. We use the CRW IDE to create the reports; we don't do that via code.
Bond
Keep all things as simple as possible, but no simpler. -said someone, somewhere
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We use DevExpress XtraReports in our solution.
One of our customers was ready to invest 2 hours in a training (we did the training) to be able to design his own reports.
After that they were self-sufficient to create their own reports.
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I didn't realize that Crystal Reports was still around. I have used multiple versions of this software during my career and never liked any of them.
You may want to try the Syncfusion reporting product. As a developer you can obtain a community license...
Steve Naidamast
Sr. Software Engineer
Black Falcon Software, Inc.
blackfalconsoftware@outlook.com
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we used stimulsoft reports (with wpf back in the day) since it needed just limited dot net dll to render and did not need the cr runtime etc and all the mess. and came with a designer you could give the client if he needed to roll his reports.. save the report add to app and run wella and it had multiple export options .since then they have multiple engines and solutions
Caveat Emptor.
"Progress doesn't come from early risers – progress is made by lazy men looking for easier ways to do things." Lazarus Long
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Don't laugh. I have converted several apps that used to use CR to put the output to Excel. More recently I have just used Excel to query the database to replace a CR.
Users really like when I do that and going back a year later, I find many of the reports I did have been edited. Everyone works with Excel. Most of the time is it is just secondary calculations. Many get very skilled. Seeing how I did the queries several have even changed the queries. In all cases the reports are now better suit the needs.
Using Excel has now achieved the goal(dream) of letting users edit reports.
So many years of programming I have forgotten more languages than I know.
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Upvoting this big time. Working with a couple of other s/w developers, I have learned that generating files that are consumable by Excel is a gem of an idea.
Another variation on this is logging (sort of like a report) - develop a consistent format and do the logging in comma delimited fashion. One guy I work with has legendary excel spreadsheets to diagnose production lines.
Charlie Gilley
“They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety.” BF, 1759
Has never been more appropriate.
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michaelbarb wrote: Don't laugh.
I'm not laughing at all.
I've created some Excel reports these last few years and users love them and they're easy for me to make and change.
Between Excel and the PDF library (both free libraries to boot), I've covered all my reporting needs 
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More than once I have had peers that sneered when I suggested it.
One went so far to ask if I needed my diaper changed. But then in the next round of layoffs he was let go and I stayed. My customers kept asking for more Excel spread sheets.
So many years of programming I have forgotten more languages than I know.
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Owing endless share term (8)
"Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming “Wow! What a Ride!" - Hunter S Thompson - RIP
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Owing endless share term (8)
Owing endless: duty
share: ration
term: duration
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Almost the same reasoning
Owing endless = Due
But the correct answer which is what's important YAUT
"Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming “Wow! What a Ride!" - Hunter S Thompson - RIP
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... when I tried to report my lateral flow test result.*
The damn QR code just wouldn't scan - until I realized I was scanning the timer, not the test strip. 
* Herself works in an Old Folks Home, and they insist on daily tests for all staff - so I do one as well to make sure she isn't going to catch it from me and take it in there. Hits my "gag reflex" every time.
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
"Common sense is so rare these days, it should be classified as a super power" - Random T-shirt
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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I have found that the latest batch we have will not scan. The early ones (mid 2021) all scanned perfectly. I suspect poor print quality on the test strip.
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I have no problem with them - when I scan the right item, that is - scanning them on my desktop webcam (Logitech 920) but Herself can get grief with her tablet (Samsung Galaxy Tab S5e). I suspect the focus doesn't like getting "that close" rather than the print quality, or possibly the background - If I hold the strip to my webcam, it has difficulty picking it out, but if I lay it on the desk and hold the camera over it, it's pretty much instant every time.
Maybe it depends what you are scanning with and how?
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
"Common sense is so rare these days, it should be classified as a super power" - Random T-shirt
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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Yes, I hold it in my hand in front of the camera on my laptop. So it could well be my shaky hand, although as I say, it did work last year.
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Richard MacCutchan wrote: it did work last year
Getting old, eh? 
"The only place where Success comes before Work is in the dictionary." Vidal Sassoon, 1928 - 2012
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Yes, very. 
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That's better than the alternative!
- I would love to change the world, but they won’t give me the source code.
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Just so long as my body and mind keep a semblance of order.
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Why are you testing ?
"Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well-preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming “Wow! What a Ride!" - Hunter S Thompson - RIP
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Herself works in an old folks home, and they are insisting on daily testing to try and keep it out of the home. Since I go different places, if I test daily as well it reduces the chances that she'll accidently take it in on her clothes, shoes, hair ... - even if she passes that morning.
"I have no idea what I did, but I'm taking full credit for it." - ThisOldTony
"Common sense is so rare these days, it should be classified as a super power" - Random T-shirt
AntiTwitter: @DalekDave is now a follower!
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