Crystal Reports 2011 on BI 4.0 server.

Question

Hello All,
I would request your valuable assistance on the below issue:
Environment:
- BI 4.0 Sp02 Patch 7
- Oracle 11g (64 bit) for Reporting
- Windows Server 2008
Description:
I have installed CR 2011 designer on the BI 4.0 server machine. The reporting database is Oracle 11g (64 bits). Both oracle 32 bit and 64 bit client is installed on the BI server.
When connected through CR 2011 designer to create a report using oracle 32 bit native libraries, I am able to create and refresh crystal reports. Once saving the report to BI 4.0 enterprise and refreshing the report from CMC or BI Launchpad, the report throws below error:
(Error: "The viewer could not process an event. Error in file ps_xxxxx.rpt: failed to load database information. [] -
Error Code:0 [CRWEB00000119]").
To resolve the issue I made following changes with in the environment variables:
ORACLE_HOME = 64 bit path
ORACLE_HOME32 = 32 bit path
LIBPATH = 64 bit path
LIBPATH32 = 32 bit path
BOE_USE_32BIT_ENV_FOR = ORACLE_HOME, LIBPATH
Once making the above changes and restarting the SIA, the crystal report started working with in CMC.
But now the report started throwing 'ORA-12157' error when ever trying to connect to Oracle server through 32 bit connection with in CR 2011 designer.
When troubleshooting the issue further, I found that the report only works from CR 2011 Designer when all other environment variables are removed except ORACLE_HOME32 path but this leads to the report to fail in CMC.
Can we have a crystal report working in both CR 2011 designer and CMC with all the environment variables intact.
Any help on this would be much appreciated..
Regards,
Phanindra Kollipara

Answer 1

Hello,
CR 2011 is a 32 bit application and therefore requires the 32 Oracle Client. BOE 4.0 is 64 bit only and therefore requires the 64 bit Client.
The problem is the order in which CR and BOE finds the Oracle Client, because they are not truely side by side supported. CR uses the Registry and the PATH statement to find the client.
For example: First one CR Designer looks in the PATH and registry for is the 32 bit client Oracle OCI.dll and that is the version the OS loads first into memory. If you change the order then the first Oracle OCI.dll is loaded from the 64 bit PATH and now BOE works and CR fails.
I don't see any way around this other than developing Reports on a stand alone PC with ONLY the 32 bit Oracle Client and then publishing the reports to BOE where ONLY the 64 bit client is installed.
There should be no difference in configuration, CR/BOE should work in their respective platforms....
Don