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Brendan Tompkins [MVP]

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We've GOT to Start a Company...

So I went to a seminar this morning that was all about SQL Reporting Services. It was, surprisingly, very informative and at a really good technical level. Hats of to MS for choosing a knowledgeable vendor/partner who can actually give a good presentation.

Anyhow, the presenter was asked if there are any tools out there for converting a Crystal .RPT file into an .RDL file (RDL is an open, xml format for reports within SQL Reporting Services). His response was that there are most likely companies working on such things, and that his company is looking at the problem of converting crystal to rdl. His words were that such a tool would be the “Silver Bullet” for the reporting market. I'll leave you to ponder connection between Crystal and scary half-man/half beast monsters that you can only kill with silver bullets, but the general consensus is that a simple tool to convert, or at least assist in the conversion of Crystal to RDL would be a killer app.

I'm no longer interested in starting companies, but this is the kind of opportunity that tempts me. Sure there are many many issues here, legal issues among the biggest. Is it legal to create such a file format conversion tool? If not, is there some intermediate format that the conversion tool could work from? How many skunk works projects/companies are out there doing this currently? How far along are they?

Like I said, I'm not really interested in starting up companies anymore, having been down that road a few times before. But I am interested in having such a tool at my disposal. How about an open source project? Anyone interested in working on something like that?

-Brendan

Published Feb 26 2004, 09:52 AM by Brendan Tompkins

Comments

Darrell said:

I'll start the company, you do the programming. :)

Seriously though, I don't think they can keep their file format under wraps. I'm sure that would be a huge migration tool.

# February 26, 2004 5:52 AM

Brendan Tompkins said:

Yo D! Sounds good to me. Funny I thought to myself this morning, " Darrell can start the company, and I'll do the programming... ;) "

Well, isn't there a similar issue with the GIF file format? I know programs can't legally write the format, but they must be able to read it? Anyone know the answer to this?

# February 26, 2004 5:54 AM

Steve said:

I think the missing peice is someone to sit around and fill their pockets with all the money. Since Darrell has already filled the role of owner, and you've already been signed up to do all the real work, that only leaves the money collecting for me. Sound good? ;-)

# February 26, 2004 9:37 AM

Brendan Tompkins said:

Steve,

Sounds good to me. Hey, my life wouldn't be any different if I ended up doing all the work while someone else makes all the money. ;)

# February 26, 2004 10:33 AM

Rich Dudley said:

Hitachi Consulting already has a tool that does this, so it's possible. Geoff Snowman revealed this last week at his SSRS demo in Pittsburgh.

# February 27, 2004 1:31 AM

SEGUN ADEDAMOLA said:

I WANT TO START A SUPPORT SERVICE

# September 17, 2004 4:28 AM

Mike said:

Here is some ideas about how to migrate the reports.

http://www.rdlcomponents.com/forums/forum.asp?forumid=4&page=0&select=45#xx45xx

# March 9, 2005 2:22 PM

Jonas said:

From Crystal [Licence.pdf]

4.6.5 (Excerpt)
"End User agrees not to alter, disassemnble, decompile, translate, adapt or
reverse-engineer the Runtime Software or the report file (.RPT) format"

"End user agrees not to use the runtime software to create for distribution
a product that converts the report file (.RPT) format to an alternative
report file format ... or product that is not the property of Crystal
Decisions"

# March 9, 2005 8:35 PM

John said:

so did you guys start working on it ?
also remember you will need an evil lawyer to support you !!

# April 27, 2005 6:17 PM

Rushit said:

Hi there..
User creates reports in MS Word... It is saved as .xml (2003 has this feature).. then we are making an xslt which will transform this xml to rdl.... we r in the process...
Rushit...Mumbai...

# May 31, 2005 11:30 PM

Jeff said:

It's not software, but there is a site that offers a conversion as a service. It's costs $25 per report, but they claim to convert Crystal Report templates to SQL Server Reporting Services RDLs.

# November 16, 2005 2:14 PM

Ashis Seth (ashishseth@dodo.com.au) said:

Hi Guys, I am aware of many companies Like hitachi, rpt to rdl, SAS, Cognos, TCS and many more. In last few months I have converted about 500 hundred reports from rpt to rdl for the company i work in. Finallt when I was about to finish all those i completely got my head around with it and have managed to develop a package which can achieve 100% conversion. But i dont know if there is any market for such product as I work in far dark cubicles of software industry. Any idea what should i do ? Is is possible for mr to start my own small company based on this product and then furhter take it to Business Intelligence Arena !

# September 27, 2006 3:31 AM

Brendan said:

Ashis,

If it really does work like you say, your only stumbling block may be getting around the licensing issues for crystal..

Once you get that figured out, I'd put up a web page, small store, and start advertising!

# September 27, 2006 7:49 AM

Rex Campbell said:

I found a company that sells the program. Boy, it's pricy! But, if it will save me time converting reports then I'll buy it. I will contact them to run one report as a test and give you feedback as to the raw program results.

# October 18, 2006 9:34 AM

rex campbell said:

here is the url:

http://www.datareference.com/products/reportmigrator/reportmigrator.htm

# October 18, 2006 9:35 AM

Jordan said:

We used RptToRdl.Com to help us with our conversions, and we were very happy with the results.

http://www.RptToRdl.Com

# January 19, 2007 9:16 AM

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About Brendan Tompkins

Brendan has been programming with .NET since the first public beta and is owner and operator of Port Technology Services, a consultancy company providing .NET application development services to the Maritime industry. In July, 2007, he was awarded the Microsoft MVP award for ASP.NET. He's also a proud co-founder of failed .COM startup Intrinsigo, and has had a hand in the failure of numerous other businesses. He currently runs CodeBetter.Com and Devlicio.us, and lives in Norfolk, Virgina with his wife Tiara and son Ian.