CrystalReportViewer Binding Scenarios that Use Crystal Services

Using Crystal Services in Visual Studio

Crystal Reports for Visual Studio allows programmatic access to Server Files via Crystal Services.

Using Crystal Services in Visual Studio 2003 and earlier

In Visual Studio 2002 and 2003 you can access Crystal reports through the Crystal Services node in the Server Explorer. When Crystal Reports and Crystal Services are both installed, Crystal Services appears as a sub node within each server listed in the Server Explorer.

The Crystal Services node expands to display lists of reports from various locations:

• The local file directory on your hard drive.
• Report Application Server (RAS)
• Crystal Enterprise (CE)

You can drag and drop any report from these lists onto a Web or Windows Form.

Crystal Services typically exposes two sub nodes that may be expandable, depending on the version of Crystal Reports that you have currently installed, and on any additional licensing that you may have for Report Application Server (RAS) or Crystal Enterprise. The table that is within the next section below describes the requirements to access a particular node.

Wrapper classes

When you drag a report from Crystal Services onto a Web or Windows Form, this creates a wrapper class instance that references the report in the Web or Windows Form Designer generated code region of the code-behind class.

The Crystal Services listed in the table below expose wrapper class types that do not contain an object model; they depend upon the limited object model provided with the CrystalReportViewer control.

• The first two rows of the table show the Crystal Services that are included with Crystal Reports for Visual Studio .NET 2002 and 2003. These Crystal Services expose groups of reports, either from the local file directory or from the WCS (Web Component Server) of Crystal Enterprise. The reports are contained in two different wrapper classes: ServerFileReport for reports from the local file directory, or EnterpriseReport for reports from the WCS server of Crystal Enterprise.
• The last two rows of the table show the Crystal Services that are included with Crystal Reports 9. These Crystal Services expose groups of reports that are served from an unmanaged RAS server or a managed RAS server (see Report Application Server (RAS)). These reports are contained in a common wrapper class that applies to both EnterpriseReportDocument scenarios.

For information about Crystal Services that expose ReportDocument wrapper classes, see ReportDocument Binding Scenarios that Use Crystal Services (VS.NET 2002 and 2003).

In this section:

• Binding to Server Files (VS .NET 2003)

• Binding to Crystal Enterprise (VS .NET 2003)

• Binding to Server Files (Visual Studio 2005 and up)

• Binding to Crystal Reports Server or BusinessObjects Enterprise (Visual Studio)

• Binding to Report Application Server (Crystal Reports 9 and up)

• Binding to Crystal Enterprise (Crystal Reports 9)