Re: Creating Reports based on hierarchical XML file

xiang_fang_at_yahoo.com (John) wrote in message news:<85a77afd.0411171629.60933893_at_posting.google.com>...
> Hi,
>
> We have XML files (and its XSD) that are dump of our tree-like data
> structure in memory. These XML files may potentially have unlimited
> levels of nesting because some elements can contain themselves
> (recursively defined).
>
> We want to build some reports using some third party reporting tool
> (Crystal Report, for example).
>
> The first question is - is there any way for Crystal Reports to
> process such complicated (some elements have recursive definitions)
> XML file directly? If not, anyone knows any other reporting tool that
> can do that job?
>
> The second question is - if we have to develop a small application
> that converts the XML to dataset, anyone who has done similar thing
> before can give us some recommendations as to which approach is the
> easiest to take (Java, .NET, etc.)? I'd appreciate it if someone can
> point me to some resources to get me started.
>
> Another approach is to convert the hierarchical XML into relational
> table set and store the data into relational database. In that case,
> the reporting tool can simply read from the database. I'd appreciate
> it if someone can let me know if there is any softeware/program that
> can do the conversion. (I heard that some database server can do the
> conversion from XML to relational tables, but didn't find anything
> concrete.)
>
> Any comment/recommendation is appreciated!
>
> Thank you for your help in advance!!

IMO, you're better off writing your report with xsl. Call nested nodes recursive using call-template passing necessary parameters as required. It will probably take less time than configuring crystal reports and won't cost you anything.

Wole Received on Thu Nov 18 2004 - 10:54:55 CST