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Issues with Blob field in Crystal reports

Former Member
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Good Morning,

After some advise in crystal reports.

Currently using a report that requires a blob field, this blob field links back to SQL. We currently use service manager and require engineers to sign there jobs off, once they input their signature on the report this should then link back to SQL.

When i am adding the blob field SM_IMAGE as the blob field on the docuement(This is in design view) Once i previe this the image will not display in my blob field which is giving me the impression that some sort of link in the middle in missing which isnt pulling through the image.

Can anyone advise who has used SQL with image fields before?

Kind Regards,

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Answers (1)

Answers (1)

abhilash_kumar
Active Contributor
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Hi Simon,

Please provide more info:

Are you using MS SQL Server?

What is the version of the CR Designer?

Does the Blob field contain images or documents (pdf, text, doc etc)?

-Abhilash

DellSC
Active Contributor
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And if the BLOB field is an image - what specific type of image is it.  Note:  Crystal will NOT display a .gif image from data!

Also, from my own experience,  if you're using MS SQL Server, the image has to be in an Image field - I'm not sure that it will display from a plain BLOB.  However, if you're using Oracle, there is no Image field type, so you have to use a BLOB.  I've also found that Crystal will not handle images from an Oracle table if you use an ODBC connection.

-Dell

Former Member
0 Kudos

Hello,

yes that is correct we are using MS SQL 2008 and crystal reports version 11

Can you confirm how i can check this file type as it wasn't myself who added that into the blob field. I cannto see anywhere in the report explorer where it indicates the file type

Kind Regards,

DellSC
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

Do you have access to the developers who wrote the program?  They could tell you the image format.  If it's an app that your company has purchased, you'll have to go to the support folks for the app to determine what type of image it is.  The other option would be to export the data from the blob field to a file and then try various image extensions (.jpeg, .bmp, etc.) on the file to see whether it will open when you double-click on it.

-Dell

former_member183750
Active Contributor
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Also, you mention "crystal reports version 11", but this could be CR XI (11.0) or CR XI R2 (v. 11.5). If you are using v. 11.0, I'd strongly recommend updating the install to v. 11.5. See this blog on how to.

- Ludek

Senior Support Engineer AGS Product Support, Global Support Center Canada

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Former Member
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Morning,

I can confirm i am currently running crystal reports 11.0. The image would come from a signature on a PDA device.  I would believe the image may be a bmp file.

Can anyone confirm if a bmp file format would work successfully within the blob field?

Kind Regards,

DellSC
Active Contributor
0 Kudos

The challenge is that for SQL Server, I'm pretty sure you need to have it in a field that has a data type of "Image" instead of a field with the data type of "BLOB".

I'm not sure whether this functionality was available in Crystal XI (or XI r2 which is version 11.5 as Ludek suggested), but instead of dragging the image field onto the report, you could try Inserting a Picture onto the report - you'll have to point it to a "default" image that's in a file - this could be something that might say "No Signature Available" or something of the sort that will appear if the blob field is null.  Then right-click on the picture, and select "Format Graphic".  Go to the "Picture" tab and click on the "Image Location" button.  Put a formula like the following in the Formula Editor:

if not IsNull({MyTable.BlobField}) then {MyTable.BlobField}

This should show your default image if there is no signature.


-Dell