Re: Custom Reports

John,

> What is the best method for creating web accessible custom reports
> for Postgres. I heard that PHP works, but I just have some concerns
> about the look. The main problem is it has to have the same
> functionality of Crystal Reports. Any suggestions?

If you are asking: How can I get Crystal Reports fancy formatting in a
web reporting interface, the answer is, you can't. HTML4 allows you a
lot of fancy tricks, these days, but the layout and display of HTML is
inherently more limited than you can get with a PostScript WSIWYG
reporting engine like Crystal Reports. You just can't do it.

If Crystal Reports level formatting is required for your application,
perhpas you should consider using Crystal Reports. Hmmm? Do they have
a web reporting tool?

You should also consider tools that output reports to PDF. That way,
you could generate the report on the server and the user could download
it as a fancy-formatted PDF.

If the web interface is more important, than PHP is probably the way to
go. However, you will have to hire an expert PHP/HTML developer to help
you, as functional and elegant HTML layout is significantly more
difficult than it looks.

It's possible that some of the enterprise web development environments
(IBM's Websphere/Java products, JBUilder Enterprise, Kylix/Dephi
Enterprise) have HTML report developers that would allow you to do
effective web-based report layout. However, all of those are $3000
products.

-Josh Berkus

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