ActiveReports provides custom components for several formats, including PDF, HTML, RTF, Excel, TIFF and plain text. Ultimate customizability is available by using any ASP.NET language.

This walkthrough illustrates how to create a simple Web application and set up custom exporting in PDF format.

This walkthrough is split up into the following activities:

• Adding an ActiveReport to an ASP.NET Web application
• Connecting the report to a data source
• Adding controls to the report to contain data
• Adding the PDF Export control to the Web Form 
• Adding code to the Web Form to export to PDF

To complete the walkthrough, you must have access to the NorthWind database (NWind.mdb). You must also have access to Internet Information Services either from your computer or from the server. You must also run the "Configure Web Sample" option from the Data Dynamics ActiveReports for .NET 2.0 program menu from your Windows Start button.

When you have completed this walkthrough, you will have a report in PDF format that looks similar to the following.

Adding an ActiveReport to an ASP.NET Web application

Important: If you are using Visual Studio.NET 2005, please see the Visual Studio.NET 2005 Web Changes topic.

To add an ActiveReport to your project

1. Open a new ASP.NET Web application in Visual Studio.
2. Click on Project > Add New Item.
3. Select ActiveReports file and rename the file rptCustEx.
4. Click Open.

Connecting the report to a data source

To connect the report to a data source

1. Click on the yellow report DataSource icon in the Detail section. This brings up the report DataSource dialog box.
2. Click on Build...
3. Select Microsoft Jet 4.0 OLE DB Provider and click Next >>
4. Click on the ellipsis to browse for the access path to NWind.mdb. Click Open once you have selected the appropriate access path.
5. Click OK to continue.
6. In the Query field, type "Select * from products order by categoryID".
7. Click OK to return to the report design surface.

Adding controls to the report to contain data

To add controls to the report

1. Add a GroupHeader/Footer section to rptCustEx.
2. Make the following changes to the group header:
   • Change the name to ghProducts
   • Change the DataField property to CategoryID
3. Add the following controls to the GroupHeader section:

   Control	Name	Text/Caption	Location
   Label	lblProductID	Product ID	0, 0
   Label	lblProductName	Product Name	1.0625, 0
   Label	lblUnitsInStock	Units In Stock	2.6875, 0
   Label	lblUnitsOnOrder	Units On Order	3.75, 0
   Label	lblUnitPrice	Unit Price	4.8125, 0

4. Add the following controls to the Detail section:

   Control	DataField	Name	Text/Caption	Location	Output Format
   TextBox	ProductID	txtProductID	Product ID	0, 0	(Empty string)
   TextBox	ProductName	txtProductName	Product Name	1.0625, 0	(Empty string)
   TextBox	UnitsInStock	txtUnitsInStock	Units In Stock	2.6875, 0	(Empty string)
   TextBox	UnitsOnOrder	txtUnitsOnOrder	Units On Order	3.75, 0	(Empty string)
   TextBox	UnitPrice	txtUnitPrice	Unit Price	4.8125, 0	Currency

Adding the PDF Export control to the Web Form

To add the PDF Export control

Note: If you are using Visual Studio 2005, please see Visual Studio.NET 2005 Web Changes.

1. Click on the PDF Export control in the appropriate toolbox to select it.
2. Drag the control onto the Web Form.
3. The control will appear in the tray underneath the Web Form.

Adding code to the Web Form to export to PDF

To write the code in Visual Basic

• Double-click on WebForm1. This creates an event-handling method for WebForm1's Page_Load event. Add the following code to the Page_Load event.

To write the code in C#

• Double-click on WebForm1. This creates an event-handling method for WebForm1's Page_Load event. Add the following code to the Page_Load event.

The following example shows what the code for the method looks like.

' Visual Basic
 Private Sub Page_Load(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) Handles _
	MyBase.Load
        Dim m_stream As New System.IO.MemoryStream()
        Dim rpt As New rptCustEx()
        rpt.Run()
        Me.PdfExport1.Export(rpt.Document, m_stream)
        m_stream.Position = 0
        Response.ContentType = "application/pdf"
        Response.AddHeader("content-disposition","inline; filename=MyExport.pdf")
        Response.BinaryWrite(m_stream.ToArray())
        Response.End()
End Sub

//C#
private void Page_Load(object sender, System.EventArgs e)
{
	System.IO.MemoryStream m_stream = new System.IO.MemoryStream();
	rptCustEx rpt = new rptCustEx();
	rpt.Run();
	this.pdfExport1.Export(rpt.Document, m_stream);
	m_stream.Position = 0;
	Response.ContentType = "application/pdf";
         Response.AddHeader("content-disposition","inline; filename=MyExport.pdf");
	Response.BinaryWrite(m_stream.ToArray());
	Response.End();
}

Samples | Walkthroughs

Tasks: Visual Studio.NET 2005 Web Changes

 

 

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