Best printing tools, components for windows.forms applications.

Question

Hi,

I have started to research for a printing component in our windows.forms based project. I want to benefit from your experiences. There are some popular reporting tools in .net world such as crystal report, active reports, xtrareports etc. Could you say advantages and disadvantages of these tools or other tools you suggest?

Answer 1

I've only worked with two of them:

• SQL Server Reporting Services: easy to learn, can be deployed to a webserver with integrated security, can integrate with sharepoint, and it comes free with SQL Server, allows you to write Visual Basic code to use in your reports. The only drawback I think is that it's sometimes very hard (or impossible) to achieve something that's a bit more advanced looking.
  • Crystal reports: rich designer, a bit harder to learn, but much more flexible. Everything can be put in a formula.

Answer 2

FastReport.Net

1. 12 years of report generations development
2. royalty-free end-user report designer. Advanced designer. For developers too.
3. Full source code is available
4. connect to any database and business objects (fastest from others for business objects!)
5. internal report dialogs and scripts
6. interactive reports