How to Install Crystal Reports 2008

On a Local Machine and Network Server

Crystal Reports 2008 is a popular and powerful database reporting tool used to generate reports from a wide range of data sources. Crystal Reports helps you design, explore, visualize, and deliver reports via the web or embedded in enterprise applications, and it will help the end user to make important decisions instantly without developers help. Read this article to find out how to install Crystal Reports 2008 on a local machine, as well as instructions for installing Crystal Reports on a network server.

The Crystal Reports Installation Wizard works with Microsoft Windows Installer which guides the installation process. The Installation Wizard automatically recognizes the computer's operating system and updates the files accordingly.

• Operating system: Windows Vista, Windows XP, Windows 2003 server.
• Processor: 450 MHz or higher Pentium-compatible CPU.
• Memory: 256 MB of RAM, 512 MB recommended.
• Disk space: 300MB available hard drive space.
• Drive: CD-ROM or DVD drive.
• Screen: [1024] x [768] pixels.

The local machine should have administrator privileges. The installation process creates registry entries and may update some system files that require administrator rights. Below are the steps to follow during installation.

1. Unzip the Crystal Reports 2008 files, and run Setup.exe file.

2. Choose the language in which you want to install Crystal Reports 2008, and also indicate whether the log file to be created in the installation, by default it is enabled.

3. Click OK. The welcome dialog box appears, indicating that installation has started.

4. Click Next button then the license agreement dialog box appears.

5. Read and accept the license agreement to proceed with the installation. Click Next button.

6. The user information dialog box appears; fill the details like name, organization and product activation keycode. To find the product keycode on Crystal Reports 2008, look on the cd sleeve. (Do not throw this away.)

7. Click Next button. A dialogue box to select installation type appears.

8. Choose the type of the installation that you want to perform:

• Typical: installs the most common application features.
• Custom: Allows you to choose which application features to install and where to install the application.

Selecting the Custom installation option invokes the Select Features dialog box as shown below, which allows you to install specific features, to change the default location of various features, and to check the amount of disk space required by each feature.

The icons in the feature tree indicate whether the feature and its sub features will be installed or not:

• A white icon means that the feature and all its sub features will be installed.
• A shaded icon means that the feature and some of its sub features will be installed.
• A yellow 1 means that the feature will be installed when required (installed on demand).
• A red X means that the feature or sub feature is either unavailable or will not be installed.

9. Click the Browse button from select installation type dialog box if you want to install Crystal Reports to a directory different from the default location. The default location for Crystal Reports is C:\Program Files\Business Objects.

10. Click Next. This brings up the Choose Language Packs dialogue box.

11. Choose any of the language packs you want to install from the list.

12. Then click Next. This displays the box which will allow you to start installation.

13. Click Next to start the copying of the files to your local drive.

14. Now click the Finish button to complete the successful install of Crystal Reports 2008!

When installing Crystal Reports from the network server, a network administrator should create an installation point and then users can access that installation point and execute setup.exe file to install Crystal Reports on their local machine. Below are the steps for installing Crystal Reports from network server.

1. The network administrator who has write access and network privileges should perform below mentioned tasks.
   • Create a new folder and share with users who need to run setup.exe file.
   • Copy all the content of the Crystal Report 2008 product distribution to this folder.
   • Assign rights to the users who need to install Crystal Reports 2008 from this folder.
2. Users can access the folder on the network that contains installation files and follow the procedure mentioned above, 'Installing Crystal Reports 2008 on the Local Machine'.