General Discussion Topics

[jignatowski]

I'm trying to modify an existing report.  I am able to open the report fine, but when I run the report it keeps asking for the login and password to access the database.    Is there a default password or what typcially is this password?

[Ralph]

To run the report you should be able to use your own username and password.  Since you've modified it and want to save it, I will tell you that I have heard different recommendations from Sage consultants about this.  I've heard that it makes sense to use the SQL Server's 'sa' account and password for this.  I've also heard that the 'sa' account should not be used.  Which statement is correct?  Well, that's hard to say, but I use the 'sa' account and have never seen a problem from it.

[trodman]

Are you running the report from the MAS 500 menu? I always thought that it used ApplicationDBRole permissions to run Crystal reports.

[oyama]

Is not there a little check mark for trusted connection? If so, check it and then no password is required.

[jmiles]

When you say "existing report," do you mean one of the reports that ships with MAS 500, or do you mean a custom report that was just built before you tried modifying it? When you run the report, do you see a sort/select screen before the actual Crystal report appears? Can you describe what kind of modifications you've made? For example, did you add a new table to the report, or were you just rearranging or adding fields from a table that was already added to the report?

[JimmyThomas]

Hello!

I'm chiming in because I have this issue as well. And the interesting this is that I had this same probably a couple of years ago, but I cannot remember how I resolved it at that time. Here are the details. We some custom Crystal reports that are called from a custom VB object. These are part of a bundle of enhancements for a MAS 500 client. We are upgrading their enhancements from v.7.05.18 to v.7.40.1. In this object, for two of the three Crystal reports called from this object, have the following problem. When trying to preview, the database login prompt displays. And even when the login credentials are correct, the login is not successful and the operator can only Cancel out and never sees the report. I must note that this problem does not occur in my development enivronment, but does occur in the QA tester's environment.

I have tried having the QA install Crystal Reports 11.5 in their environment, and we have done "Set Datasource Location" on all of the tables in order to make sure they are pointing to the current database. Even so, QA still gets this problem on two of the three Crystal files in this object.

As I say, I had this problem in another circumstance a couple of years ago, but for the life of me, I just cannot remember how we resolved at that time. Any assistance is greatly appreciated!

Jimmy Thomas, Engineer

Blytheco, LLC

[Jima]

You can do several things here, but I do not recommend using the SA user credentials. These credentials have highly sensitive permissions that you do not want to have exposed/leaked.

1. Create a 'reporting user' in SQL and assign it only the required permissions. You could do this per report (super paranoia mode) or as a general read permission on key tables. This would not be the best way to do it.

2. Use the trusted connection checkbox as mentioned earlier in this thread. Make sure the connection you are using the database is the MAS 500 ODBC connection (the one created by the MAS500 client install) and not a custom one. Otherwise you would need to add that ODBC connection to every machine running the report. When the report runs in MAS500, MAS500 uses the Application Role to run the report and because the report is in trusted connection mode it should run correctly.

If you get a connection error when running the report, make sure the DB conneciton is using your live server and live database. If you had a database called 'MAS500_TESTBED' for example and you made the report using the ODBC connection to that database then the report remembers it. In that case you have to change the database location for each table used in the report in Crystal via the Database > Set Location option, create a new connection, select the live server ODBC connection and database, set trusted connection checkbox, select the corresponding table in the list and click 'Update'.

[HeadHoncho]

I realize that this is only indirectly related.  In general, I recommend always using some sort of Sage 500 user.  Some processing within Sage 500 will return differing results for a Sage 500 user versus a non-Sage 500 user.  I don't recall exactly where, but I think it was related to a user's business date setting.  In that case, it used a system date instead of a user business date as an unassociated SQL user does not have a Sage 500 account, so there is not user date to be had.

[jmiles]

I'm not sure if this is the same issue, but we just had a client report login issues with a custom Crystal report. The error message is as follows:

Logon failed.

Details: ADO Error Code: 0x80040e4d

Source: Microsoft OLE DB Provider for SQL Server

Description: Login failed for user 'admin'.

SQL State: 42000

Native Error: 18456 [Database Vendor Code: 18456]

This is a plain Crystal report, not one associated with a VB6 host screen. The client likely developed this herself. The problems seems to be that she used ADO/OLE DB when she chose her data source in Crystal. Once the data source was changed to ODBC (using the "MAS 500" DSN), the report seemed to run properly. This would support Jima's #2 suggestion, or at least the part about using the "MAS 500" ODBC DSN.

[jmiles]

Sorry, I forgot to mention that the client was trying to launch her report from the MAS 500 menu. That's when the errors would occur.