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From Crystal Reports 2008 to SAP Crystal Reports 2011 or SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise
Added by Martha Levi, last edited by Mike Seblani on May 09, 2012

Product versions: SAP BusinessObjects BI4.0, SAP Crystal Reports 2011, SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise 4.0

Two versions of SAP Crystal Reports in BI 4.0

With the release of SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 there are two versions of SAP Crystal Reports available: SAP Crystal Reports 2011 and SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise The first question we usually come across is: Why are you releasing two versions? The reason behind the two versions is due to the need to innovate alongside the need to continue providing our existing customers with the ability to use CR as they have in the past. We have been working on this new version of Crystal Reports for about 4 years. We felt that, with the release of SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0, it gave us a unique opportunity to release the new designer to a target audience of customers who leverage the BI platform and connect to data from SAP BW. As mentioned, we wanted to continue providing the features with which our existing customers were familiar. As such, we needed to continue delivering Crystal Reports in it's current form as well. In the future, many of the features with which are customers are familiar from Crystal Reports 2008 will move into the Crystal Reports for Enterprise designer; however, this will take a few minor releases to achieve. Even when we have closed the major gaps between Crystal Reports for Enterprise and Crystal Reports 2008, we will continue to deliver and support minor enhancements to the Crystal Repots 2008 / Crystal Reports 2011 line of products. This will be required as not every feature from the designer and associated SDKs will be moved into the Crystal Reports for Enterprise product line.

Learn More You can read more about the Crystal Reports strategy with both designers in my colleague Blair's blog.

Thus, we move on to the purpose of this article. What are the differences between these two versions? When should I use which version?. In this article you will find answers to these questions so you can take full advantage of SAP BusinessObjects BI4.0 by knowing when to utilize SAP Crystal Reports 2011 or SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise or both.

SAP Crystal Reports 2011

SAP Crystal Reports 2011 is an incremental update to Crystal Reports 2008 with the addition of a few new features. It is focused on providing existing customers with the functionality they have in Crystal Reports.

How is SAP Crystal Reports 2011 different from Crystal Reports 2008?
Only a few new features have been added to SAP Crystal Reports 2011: New Read-Only Report Format Export to XSLX from the report designer and viewer Integration with Visual Studio 2010

Learn More about SAP Crystal Reports 2011 Check out this blog and these educational videos.

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SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise

SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise is the newly designed version of the Crystal Reports designer. This version is focused on streamlined report design, reporting against the new BI 4.0 semantic layer and SAP BW data. SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise is the foundation for all future releases of Crystal Reports.

How is SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise different from Crystal Reports 2008? What is new?
The user interface has been completely redesigned offering a streamlined interface to allow the creation of reports with reduced amount of effort. Semantic layer support is improved. With SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise you can create reports against the new BI 4.0 common semantic layer From SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise you can connect directly to a SAP BEx query using SAP BICS connectivity. SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise processing servers in BI4.0 support native 64 bit. Multilingual capabilities have been improved as you can translate all text-based elements, and all translations can be managed and scheduled at the platform level by the Translation Management tool. New BI platform alerting framework can leverage alerts created in SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise. This allows users to manage their alert subscriptions on their own, thus reducing management overhead on the report designers.

Learn More about SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise Check out this video, this blog, and these educational videos.

What is not available yet and when should you expect it in SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise?
Forward Looking Statements The content in the table below contains forward looking statements regarding future releases of SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise. Anything that is denoted as a planned feature could change at any point in time. Every effort will be made to keep these statements up-to-date according to the most current SAP Crystal Reports roadmap.

Functional Area Create Reports on top of unmodeled data (i.e., direct to data) Crystal Reports specific APIs for consumption *

BI 4.0

[Planned] BI 4.0 Feature Pack 3 Planned for specific data sources including simplified connection authoring, deployment and administration Planned via REST and AJAX APIs. Review of existing applications workflows is recommended to insure support through REST and AJAX APIs.

Future Minor Release More data sources and connection management features will be considered

Planned improvements to both the REST and AJAX API to make them more comprehensive Continuing improvements to REST and AJAX APIs based on what our customers ask for. Currently not planned

Crystal Reports specific APIs for report creation and modification * Expose and interact with reports from Live Office Locate documents via platform search View Time Filtering (formerly provided by Business Views) Dynamic Data Connections (e.g., via Business Views) Scheduled LOVs User Function Libraries (UFL) Custom Functions Available within a report (not shared through the BI repository) OLAP Grid / OLAP Cube Report Unable to render embedded object: File (warning.gif! Only possible thorugh the Common Symantic layer \\ ) not found. Only possible thorugh the Common Symantic layer Label Creation Wizard Geographical Maps Barcodes SAP ERP Data Access Oracle eBusiness Integration Kit Siebel Integration Kit JD Edwards Integration Kit PeopleSoft Integration Kit Possible via Dashboard Design Integration

REST and AJAX APIs are targeted to satisfy the core use cases.

Planned via Common Semantic Layer

Currently not planned

Planned via Common Semantic Layer Planned Available within a report (not shared through the BI repository) Only possible thorugh the Common Symantic layer Available within a report (not shared through the BI repository)

Currently not planned Possible via Dashboard Design Integration Planned Planned Available via the Common Semantic Layer Available via the Common Semantic Layer Currently not planned Currently not planned Currently not planned Currently not planned

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Saving Crystal Reports functions, images and text objects to the BI repository Read-Only Report Format (RPTR) Designer Hyperlinking Wizard Designer Performance Information Dialogue Save Export Options in Crystal Reports Designer CR 2008/2011 Dynamic Cascading Prompts Database Synonyms Submit enhancment requests for SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise here Automatically converted to static prompt (can be converted to semantic layer prompt) Automatically converted to static prompt (can be converted to semantic layer prompt)

Research in Progress

Research in Progress

Research in Progress Research in Progress

Research in Progress

Automatically converted to static prompt (can be converted to semantic layer prompt) Currently not planned

There is no Java or .NET SDK to create standalone 2 tier applications or to create applications that create or modify SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise, however applications can be created with the SAP BusinessObjects BI 4.0 SDK to use the BI4.0 platform servers to manage, schedule and view reports for both SAP Crystal Reports 2011 and SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise.

SAP Crystal Reports 2011 vs SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise

Data connectivity
Data source Direct data access drivers (RDBMS) Direct data access drivers (OLAP) ODBC, JDBC Legacy universes (unv) Universes (unx) Business Views Analysis Views only for cascading prompts limited only BEx queries with unx SAP Crystal Reports 2011 SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise

User Interface
SAP Crystal Reports 2011 SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise

User Interface Same as Crystal Reports 2008 New interface i.e. tabbed toolbar, smart guidelines, smart default formatting

BI 4.0 Platform
SAP Crystal Reports 2011 SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise Processing Servers 32 bit native 64 bit Alerts are leveraged to new platform alerting framework

New platform Alerting framework Not available

Servers can be run side by side on the same server. SAP BusinessObjects BI4.0 server install package installs both set of servers by default. Reports created in SAP Crystal Reports 2011 will processed on the 32 bit servers, reports created in Crystal Reports for Enterprise will be processed by the 64 servers.

NetWeaver Integration
Feature SAP BW connectivity SAP ERP connectivity Multilingual capabilities SAP prompting SAP Toolbar BW Publisher Life Cycle Management SAP Crystal Reports 2011 Via MDX Available Managed via SAP BW Via online prompting and Personalization Available Available SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise Via BICS to BEx queries Not available yet Managed via SAP BI 4.0 Translation Manager Via new Semantic Layer no RRI neither Personalization No longer relevant Reports are no longer saved to BW

Via BW Publisher and NetWeaver Transports Via BI 4.0 Life Cycle Manager and Netweaver CTS+

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SAP Crystal Reports 2011 or SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise

In the future SAP Crystal Reports 2011 and SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise will be merged into one version; SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise is the foundation for future versions. In BI 4.0 you can choose to leverage one version or the other or both depending on features and data connectivity needed. SAP Crystal Reports 20011 and SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise can run side by side on the same desktop client. In general if you are currently using Crystal Reports 2008 and you want to leverage the new semantic layer and the new BI4.0 platform then SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise is the version of choice. If you require report creation API, direct data access, SAP ERP access then SAP Crystal Reports 2011 is the version of choice. The following table summarizes general recommendations on which version to use based on the data access required: Data Source SAP BusinessObjects BI4.0 relational universe (unx), olap universe (unx) SAP NetWeaver BW 7 Analysis Views SAP NetWeaver BW 3.5 Business Views Direct RDBMS or OLAP access SAP ERP Live Office General Recommendation SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise SAP Crystal Reports 2011 SAP Crystal Reports 2011 SAP Crystal Reports 2011 SAP Crystal Reports 2011 SAP Crystal Reports 2011

Overview of Upgrade process

From Crystal Reports 2008 to SAP Crystal Reports 2011
If your reports are in the BI platform, all Crystal Reports 2008 are automatically upgraded to SAP Crystal Reports 2011 when you use the BI4.0 Upgrade Manager tool.

From Crystal Reports 2011 to SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise

Once your reports are in SAP Crystal Reports 2011 format, you can upgrade the reports at your own pace. (SAP Crystal Reports 2011 and SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise can run side by side on the same machine) In BI4.0 when you open a SAP Crystal Reports 2011 report in SAP Crystal Reports for Enterprise a wizard appears to help you change the database connection to a Universe (unx) or BICS (BW connectivity).

The wizard will also detect any features that are in the report that are not supported in Crystal Reports for Enterprise. These missing features are listed previously in this article.

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