ActiveReports allows you to save and load a report as a memory stream. Saving a report as a memory stream makes it possible to save and load reports from a database or pass reports back and forth between DLLs.

This walkthrough is split up into the following activities:

• Adding an ActiveReport to a Visual Studio project
• Connecting the report to a data source
• Adding controls to the report to contain data
• Adding the viewer to the Windows Form
• Adding code to the Form_Load event to save the report to a memory stream and load it to the viewer
• Viewing the report

To complete the walkthrough, you must have access to the Northwind database.
A copy is located at C:\Program Files\Data Dynamics\ActiveReports for .NET 3.0\Data\NWIND.MDB.

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

Adding an ActiveReport to a Visual Studio project

To add an ActiveReport to your project

1. Open a new project in Visual Studio.
2. From the Project menu, select Add New Item.
3. Select ActiveReports 3.0 File and rename the file rptMemoryStream.
4. Click Open (Add in Visual Studio 2005).

Connecting the report to a data source

To connect the report to a data source

1. Click on the gray report DataSource icon in the Detail section to open the report DataSource dialog.
2. Click Build.
3. Select Microsoft Jet 4.0 OLE DB Provider and click Next.
4. Click the ellipsis button to browse for the access path to the NorthWind database. Click Open once you have selected the appropriate access path.
5. Click OK to continue.
6. In the Query field, type "Select * from customers ORDER BY country".
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 rptMemoryStream by right-clicking on the design surface of the report and selecting Insert > Group Header/Footer.
2. Make the following changes to the group header:
   • Change the name to ghCustomers
   • Change the BackColor property to RosyBrown 
   • Change the DataField property to Country
3. In the Report Explorer, expand the Fields node, then the Bound node. Drag the following fields onto rptMemoryStream and set the properties of each textbox as indicated.

   Field	Section	Location	Text
   Country	GroupHeader	0, 0	Country
   CustomerID	Detail	0, 0	Customer ID
   CompanyName	Detail	1.125, 0	Company Name
   Address	Detail	3.01, 0	Address
   City	Detail	4.375, 0	City
   Phone	Detail	5.437, 0	Phone

4. Set the CanShrink property of the Detail Section to True.

Adding the viewer to the Windows Form

To add the viewer to the Windows Form

1. Click on the ActiveReports viewer control in the appropriate toolbox and drag it onto the Windows Form.
2. Set the viewer control's Dock property to Fill.

Adding  code to the Form_Load event

To write the code in Visual Basic or C#

• Double-click the title bar of the Windows Form to create an event-handling method for the Form_Load event. Add code to the handler to:
  • Save the report to a memory stream
  • Load the memory stream to the ActiveReports viewer

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

  'Visual Basic
  Private Sub Form1_Load(ByVal sender As System.Object, ByVal e As System.EventArgs) _
     Handles MyBase.Load
        Dim strm As New System.IO.MemoryStream()
        Dim rpt As New rptMemoryStream()
        rpt.Run()
        rpt.Document.Save(strm)
        Dim theBytes(strm.Length) As Byte
        strm.Read(theBytes, 0, Int(strm.Length))
        strm.Position = 0
        Viewer1.Document.Load(strm)
  End Sub
  
  //C#
  private void Form1_Load(object sender, System.EventArgs e)
  {
     System.IO.MemoryStream strm = new System.IO.MemoryStream();
     rptMemoryStream rpt = new rptMemoryStream();
     rpt.Run();
     rpt.Document.Save(strm);
     byte[] theBytes = new byte[strm.Length];
     strm.Read(theBytes, 0, (int)strm.Length);
     strm.Position =0;
     viewer1.Document.Load(strm);
  }

Viewing the report

To view the report

• Press F5 to run the project.

See Also

 

 

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