Craig, Thanks for all the help. This issue was very frustrating. I have spent 4 days looking for a solution. I finally found a reference to a pdf from the SAP site. I would not wish that site on anyone, man...how convoluted...everything is buried in so many layers you cannot find anything. Like someone said, the SAP white papers give you all kinds of info saying it can be done but not how to do it. I even tried the Dependency Walker app to figure out the missing modules, but it didnt help because there are too many other interfaces needed.

The solution was to create an msi with the VS Installer. there was so much mis-information because of so many variables between .Net and VB. These files are all that are necessary to deploy the Crystal Runtime for reports to work with printing or viewing. This assumes the developer is using a Developers version of CR that installs the msm files in "C:\Program Files\Common Files\Merge Modules."

1. Go to Start > Programs > Microsoft Visual Studio 6.0 > Microsoft Visual Studio 6.0 Enterprise Tools and click Visual Studio Installer. The New Project dialog box appears.
2. Expand the Visual Studio node, and select Visual Studio Installer Projects.
3. Select the Empty Installer icon and then click Open.
4. Go to the Project menu and click Add Merge Modules. In the Browse for Merge Modules File dialog box, browse to C:\Program Files\Common Files\Merge Modules and add these RDC merge modules:

• CrystalReports11_RDC_License.msm


• CrystalReports11_RDC_Reportengine.msm


• CrystalReports11_RDC_Runtime.msm

To build an Installer Package (.msi) file:
1. Open the solution containing your Visual Studio Installer project.
2. In the Project Explorer, select your Installer project.
3. Under the Build menu, change the Build Configuration from Debug to Release. You may run the build in debug mode if you want to ensure it compiles.
4. In the Project Explorer, right-click your project and click Properties. In the Properties dialog box, under the Build tab, ensure the Build type value is set to either:
• Installer
• Installer with Windows Installer Loader
5. Change the Output Folder box to the folder path where you want the .msi file to be created. Click OK.
6. In the Project Explorer, right-click your project and click Build. Its size is 58 meg, mucho files.

Well...that's it. I created the project in "\My Documents\Visual Studio Projects\Crystal12_Runtime_Install\." The msi file will be in "\My Documents\Visual Studio Projects\Crystal12_Runtime_Install\Output\DISK_1\."

I hope this thread will give someone some relief. Craig, you are welcome to use this info on your website.

Chuck


>He's using version 11 (XI). The .rpt file format is not compatible with 8.5.
>
>>Which versino of Crystal Reports runtime do you need? I had this headace a couple of years ago and ended up just using the 8.5 runtimes - which worked even though my reports were written with a later version (I think we had to make a few minor changes to a couple of the reports to fix a 'feature not found' problem)