FIGURE C

The Highlighting Expert assists a developer in applying conditional formatting statements to number and currency fields. Click picture for a larger image.

Charting in Crystal Reports
Seagate has made it very easy to add a sophisticated chart to any report. Figure D shows how the charting expert does just about all of the work needed to create an easy to understand report.

FIGURE D

The Charting Expert provides an easy to use interface to creating professional charts and graphs. Click picture for a larger image.

First, you select the type of chart you would like. The list of choices has been expanded beyond the standard line, bar, and pie charts to include options such as a bubble chart, stock chart, scatter plots, and more. Next, you can assign different data fields to the chart axes and finish up with some formatting options. Yet another nice feature added was the chart analyzer. This is a very easy way to change the attributes of an individual chart.

Report distribution
So you have to create these fine reports with conditional highlighting, fancy charts and maps, drill down sections, and a very cool watermark printed on each page of your report. Now what?

Get that report out to people. Show off your work. You have two options, and of course, one of them is much better. The first option is that you can export your report out to MS Word or MS Excel, but you can be guaranteed that you will lose some of the formatting in the transition. Or if you are a really savvy Crystal Report user and have read this DominoPower article, you will choose to use the report distribution expert. This expert will compile your report, any DLLs or supporting files needed, and even the data. All of this is "packaged" and saved as a SETUP.EXE file. You are able to set the destination location so you could easily install this on a network. This feature has the potential to be very beneficial to those users who do not have a need for a full license of Crystal Reports but need to see your reports in their intended formatting.

Rebecca Fogle Warriner is a consultant with Tactica Technology Group in Dallas, Texas. When she is not in the office working on her project management and coding tasks, she enjoys keeping fit with her husband, entomologist Richard Warriner. You can contact Rebecca at rebecca.warriner@tacticatech.com