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Does anyone out there know of a way to link dynamic reports, either from Crystal Repors or MS SQL Server Report Services onto a web page?
Also, I've recently gained access to the back end of the data tables and am learning to run queries.
What table(s) to do I select to link table ID's to their actual table name...i.e. Constituent Code (ID) to Constituent Code (Donor).
To link between the tables (for constituent data), you use the records.id column. records.constituent_id is the ID you see in RE. Most of the tables use constit_id to hold the record ID, but you occaisionaly see records_id. The backend is a bigger mess then the GUI as far as consistency. I've put the code to pull all of the constituent codes for every constituent... Feel free to modify at will... I didn't qualify anything because I don't know your particular setup...
Code:
select records.constituent_id, tableentries.longDescription
from tableentries, constituent_codes, records
where tableentries.tableentriesid = constituent_codes.code
and constituent_codes.constit_id = records.id
and records.constituent_id is not null ;
As far as displaying dynamic reports, your options are pretty limited. I'm not a web designer (nor do I have any desire to be), so my solution was to purchase Crystal Reports Server from business objects (maybe soon to be SAP?). This "server" allows me to publish the reports to a java/.NET viewer that then allows the campuses to run them as needed/wanted with various parameters... I have about 60 reports published at this point...
Hope that helps,
Doug
__________________ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Doug Creek
RE Database Administrator
University of Alaska Foundation sndgc@email.alaska.edu
Thank you! I suppose there's no reference sheet or guide explaning the table structure? That would be too easy!!
Are you referring to the Crystal Reports Enterprise? What does something like that cost? I did download the SQL Server reporting tool in addtion to having RE Crystal. But, I don't see an option on there either.
Somewhere in the shared files is a small database diagram that I did a long time ago that can get you started... I've attached it to this because I couldn't find it... Drew has also put some things out there that might be useful...
Depends on your organization. We got a good deal because we are a university, but that was almost 3 years ago, so I'd imagine the price as gone up since then...
Doug
__________________ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Doug Creek
RE Database Administrator
University of Alaska Foundation sndgc@email.alaska.edu
another way is to run it through SQL reporting services
which I believe is what BB is planning for next edition of RE, they admitted already they are planning to get rid of Crystal Reports in favor of SQL 2005 Reporting Services
That is good info to know....I am trying to decide what route to go with Crystal Reports or SQL reporting services, so that's helpful. Did you hear what Blackbaud's implementation timeframe might be? Also, do you have abbreviated instructions on how to embed reports created from SQL report services? What I'd like to do is provide publshed reports to staff and outside parties via the web that would dynamically refresh...but have no clue how to do this.
which I believe is what Blackbaud is planning for next edition of RE, they admitted already they are planning to get rid of Crystal Reports in favor of SQL 2005 Reporting Services
I think they were actually looking at SQL 2008 Reporting Services, because the 2005 version requires a web server, but the 2008 version does not.
Drew
__________________ J. Drew Allen
Children's Hospital of Philadelphia
Crystal Reports and SQL Server Consultant
It is better to live your destiny imperfectly than to live an imitation of somebody else's life with perfection.
We usually distribute dynamic reports via scheduled email with a link to specific report configured and published via reporting services, certain reports are available on demand through a published link or small VBA interface created for this purpose.
IIS is required component to publish in SQL2005, SQL2008 doesn't require publishing server as it has got it's own equivalent.
During last 2007 BB conference in Charleston RE ver 8 was announced with unknown schedule but only indication for end of 2008 or Q1 2009. I doubt they will be rady, not to mention if users are going to be ready to fork major investment in skills, training, development, hardware, new SQL licences etc
Also worthy to mention BBannouncement that ver.8 is in BB hosted enviroment. I don't know if this is final as certain organization wouldn't be happy to loose control over data.
Interesting... BB is pretty much skipping all over the place aren't they... We just moved to 2005 about a month ago, so I highly doubt we're moving on from there for at least a few years... And we definitely will NOT move to having our data hosted at BB. Didn't Microsoft try that with the office products and find out just how bad of an idea it is........
__________________ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Doug Creek
RE Database Administrator
University of Alaska Foundation sndgc@email.alaska.edu
We usually distribute dynamic reports via scheduled email with a link to specific report configured and published via reporting services, certain reports are available on demand through a published link or small VBA interface created for this purpose.
IIS is required component to publish in SQL2005, SQL2008 doesn't require publishing server as it has got it's own equivalent.
During last 2007 Blackbaud conference in Charleston RE ver 8 was announced with unknown schedule but only indication for end of 2008 or Q1 2009. I doubt they will be rady, not to mention if users are going to be ready to fork major investment in skills, training, development, hardware, new SQL licences etc
Also worthy to mention BBannouncement that ver.8 is in BB hosted enviroment. I don't know if this is final as certain organization wouldn't be happy to loose control over data.
Also, I've recently gained access to the back end of the data tables and am learning to run queries.
What table(s) to do I select to link table ID's to their actual table name...i.e. Constituent Code (ID) to Constituent Code (Donor).
I rely on heavily on The Raiser's Edge Database Reference. It should be installed as part of your help files. I have a shortcut on my desktop. Actually, someone in my organization coverted the help file to an html web page, so we can use Dreamweaver to update it with our own developer notes.
My RE database reference is found in the path below. Maybe yours is similar. Unfortunately, they don't provide any information about Views, but I find it very useful for Tables.
Linear Mode
