Offline product catalog

Question

I am looking for a way to automate the production of an offline product catalog using product data contained in an SQL Server database.

I have thought about using both Crystal Reports and SQL Server Reporting Services for this but there may be something better suited for the job.

There is a requirement to display product images also (currently stored in the database).

I thought about perhaps doing a simple Word Mail Merge for this but am not sure how I will handle images.

Suggestions appreciated

Thanks Ben

Answer 1

I imagine that crystal and reporting services would handle this quite easily. It would really depend on what you have access to and what you have experience in. Putting a report server on you computer to do this would be pretty easy. I have not used crystal much but when I last did there were painful license requirements.

Answer 2

I suggest to you that use reporting service. you can use rdlc reports. I use rdl and rdlc reports for reporting issues in a large project and I don't have any problem.

Answer 3

to hop on the reporting services bandwagon, you can use subscriptions in RS to easily automate this kind of thing once you have the catalog report written