Data Source Configuration In Crystal Reports

Here is a tip on how to troubleshoot an error in a Crystal Reports report when using files like Excel and Access.

The error that you get when trying to view the report in InfoView is Error: The database logon information for this report is either incomplete or incorrect.



This is due to the configuration made in Crystal Reports when creating the report against an Excel file. When you create the report you often point your data source against a file through a mapped drive. This setup doesn't work when publishing the report to the repository on the BusinessObjects Enterprise server. You must specifiy the data source name as an UNC path (like //server/) or as an name of an DSN that exist on the server.

If you have entered a path for a mapped drive and you try to reconfigure that setting in Central Management Console (CMC) it will not work. I don't know why this doesn't work for this data source setting.

Example, if you make a report with a local DSN with name DSN_A against a database server named DB_A and publish it to the repository server there are two scenarios;

• Scenario 1: The DSN exist on the BOE server with the same name and everything works!
• Scenario 2: A DSN with name DSN_A doesn't exist on the BOE server but another DSN against DB_A exist with the name DSN_B. In this case you can open up Database Configuration on the report and remap data source DSN_A to the local DSN (DSN_B) on the BOE server. And now everything works!

But for the case with a data source file path it doesn't work.

Perhaps elementary for some but not for me. Why doesn't this work? It could work if you wanted to...