Since Version 1, Crystal Reports has exposed the Report Engine functionality via a C API that you could use to make direct Report Engine calls.
Using these direct Report Engine calls you can access more functionality than offered with the OCX. However, because it was designed for C/C++, it wasn't easy to use the API inside Visual Basic and some of the API wasn't available because of Visual Basic limitations in creating C style structures.
As a Visual Basic developer, you needed to add more codeand in many cases complex code with multiple parametersinto an application to execute a report. This was especially time consuming if you were unfamiliar with API calls.
If you have used the Report Engine API, the RDC is appealing because it offers additional functionality, and is a much easier way to experience the power of the Crystal Report Print Engine.
The Crystal Report Engine API is only available in standalone versions of Crystal Reports (i.e. version 8). No new features will be added in future releases of Crystal Reports.
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