FastReport Studio 4

Powerful, compact, and flexible report generator with visual report designer for business and developers to generate reports quickly and efficiently. Includes tools for building report generators into software products to be developed.

Pros: FastReport Studio for business contains powerful standalone visual report designer. One could build these report generator facilities into software products being developed in house. The studio includes many demo samples of reports as well as work methods together with MS Access and MS Excel office applications.

FastReport Studio for developers has a COM+ based program interface for managing report building and managing corresponding components. Source examples are included that illustrate integration of various objects supplied with the studio. The facilities provided are compatible with development environments that support component based development such as Microsoft Visual C++, Microsoft CSharp.NET, Microsoft Visual Fox Pro, Microsoft Access, Microsoft Visual Basic, Borland Delphi, and so on. Built-in report designer has a customizable interface that helps in-place editing, zooming, has rulers, guides and multi level undo/redo. Grids can be set to centimeters, inches or pixels. Script editor, Visual SQL query builder are other tools that help with the report generation design.

Data for the report fields can be through MS ADO engine, data supplied by an application or data generated by built-in scripts. A range of report styles can be supported based on the data supplied. These can be free-form, simple list, multilevel groups, multilevel master-detail, multicolumn, cross-tabs, charts, labels, nested reports (sub-reports), special dot-matrix reports to print on dot-matrix printers, Interactive (dialogs, hyperlinks, etc), or a combination of all of above.

User friendly interface makes reviewing the report formats easy in a what you see is what you get kind of screen, side by side previews and so on. Get the proof printed or save in any of the preferred format that includes PDF, RTF, MS Excel, XML, HTML, JPEG, BMP, TIFF, plain text and CSV.

Cons: The interaction feel a little too complex but consider the complex set of features supported that is to be expected.

Overall a certain 4 star candidate.

FastReport® Studio for business contains powerful standalone visual report designer, scheduler of reports building, saving and distribution. Also it includes many demo samples of reports as well as work methods together with MS Access and MS Excell office applications.
FastReport® Studio for developers includes powerful full-value COM+ program interface for further verification and managing of report building and handling; command line interface for report building and bringing out management; file package for end-user free application distribution; development means and examples sources.
- Common features
Powerful, compact, and flexible environment for creating reports; Compatible with various development environments, which supports COM model (Microsoft Visual C++, Microsoft CSharp.NET, Microsoft Visual Fox Pro, Microsoft Access, Microsoft Visual Basic, Borland Delphi, and so on); Includes set of language resources for 27 languages.
- Data sources
Microsoft ADO engine; Data supplied by application; Data generated by built-in script.
- Supported report types and data processing
Free-form; Simple list; Multilevel groups; Multilevel master-detail; Multicolumn; Cross-tabs; Charts; Labels; Nested reports (subreports); Special dot-matrix reports to print on dot-matrix printers; Interactive (dialogs, hyperlinks, etc); All of above in any combination.
- Preview, print, and export
Friendly WYSIWYG interface; Multipage, continuous, side-by-side previews; Outline support; Search text in preview window; Edit report in preview window; Print on any local and network printers, including dot-matrix printers; Export in PDF, RTF, Microsoft Excel, XML, HTML, JPEG, BMP, TIFF, plain text, and CSV formats.
- Report design
Built-in report designer with customizable interface; In-place editing, zooming, rulers, guides and undo/redo; Three types of grid: centimeters, inches, pixels; Script editor; Visual SQL Query builder