Running multiple Crystal engines

Question

Hello,
Currently, we have an application that has worked quite well with multiple crystal engines installed.  A client can have a report that exports as they expect in say Crystal Reports 10 and also create new reports against Crystal Reports 11 (or Release 2).  The client specifies (within a table in the our DB) which version of crystal to use with a given report and we have a report engine factory that returns the appropriate crystal engine to use for processing the report.
Now the problem...
I recently brought down the trial version of Crystal Reports 2008 and have attempted to create a .NET factory to deliver this report engine.  If I only have Crystal Reports 2008 accessed from our application, it will work as expected (for the most part - some features from the RDC no longer exist - but that is another story).  As soon as I attempt to run a report that requires a different crystal engine, the next engine in always fails.
For example, if I run a Crystal 11 report after a successful Crystal 2008 report I will receive an "Invalid TLV record" error during the call of the "OpenReport" method.  At first I thought this was a possible bug in my code, but if I do the opposite (run the Crystal 11 report first then Crystal 2008), the Crystal 11 report will work without problems and then a Crystal 2008 report I will receive the error "Retrieiving the COM class factory for component with CLSID XXX failed due to the following error: 80000003" during the "OpenReport" method.
Has anyone else experience this problem?  If so, is there a way to work around it?
Thanks in advance any help you can provide,
Tom

Answer 1

Jason,
Thanks for the response!
OK, so I still think this is a problem and I've proven it by only writing .NET code.  Here is what I did.  I created three C# projects within a solution:
1. A Crystal 11 Release 2 project that simply implements an interface that has three methods on it (OpenReport, RecordSelectionFormula, and CloseReport).  This project implements the .NET Crystal objects from Crystal 11 Release 2).
2. A Crystal 2008 project that simply implements an interface that has three methods on it (OpenReport, RecordSelectionFormula, and CloseReport).  This project implements the .NET Crystal objects from Crystal 2008).
3. A Windows project that simply calls on both of the above projects (both are referenced in this project) and calls "OpenReport", then "RecordSelectionCriteria" (in a MessageBox), and finally "CloseReport".
"OpenReport" - uses ReportDocument.Load.
"CloseReport" - uses ReportDocument.Close - extremely slow process!!!
"RecordSelectionFormula" - uses ReportDocument.RecordSelectionFormula (my interface implements a set/get)
As you can see I'm using NO COM at all.  When running this test project, I get the "Retrieving the COM class factory for component with CLSID XXX failed due to the following error: 80000003." error even in this case.
Below is an example of the "Windows project" code.  I have the entire example in a zip file that I can deliver to someone if they want to see exactly what I'm talking about.  I just didn't see a way to attach the example zip file with this post.
=====================================================================
using System;
using System.Collections.Generic;
using System.Windows.Forms;
namespace TestProj
    static class Program
        /// <summary>
        /// The main entry point for the application.
        /// </summary>
        [STAThread]
        static void Main()
            Application.EnableVisualStyles();
            Application.SetCompatibleTextRenderingDefault(false);
            try
                TestProj.CrystalEngine crystal11Release2 = new CrystalEngine();
                crystal11Release2.OpenReport("Place your report name here...");
                MessageBox.Show(crystal11Release2.RecordSelectionForumla);
                crystal11Release2.CloseReport();
                // You will see this error with a COM error even though no COM is being used in the project???
                TestProj.Crystal2008 crystal2008 = new Crystal2008();
                crystal2008.OpenReport("Please your report name here...");
                MessageBox.Show(crystal2008.RecordSelectionForumla);
                crystal2008.CloseReport();
            catch (Exception excep)
                MessageBox.Show(excep.Message);
            Application.Exit();
=====================================================================
Just to reiterate, I have no COM implemented in this example and yet the same problem occurs.
Any assistance with this problem would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks again,
Tom