This is in continuation to this thread…
The add-in allows you to convert *.rep files to txt, xls and pdf files.
It also lets you choose which tab you want to export and much more.
We have tested the add-in in WinXP and Win2K. If you have any suggestions or questions please post them in this thread.
The fully documented version can be downloaded here.
One more time thank you to Avaksi for the collaboration.
Cheers!
Olivier
OlivierV (BOB member since 2002-10-15)
I used this converter. It is really great. Thanks guys!
I think we have three separate discussions of this now. Maybe we can get it moved to the Code forum and put a link to the definitive discussion of the tool.
Cindy Clayton 
(BOB member since 2002-06-11)
OK. I put enough info in the Code forum to get this in there. The code hasn’t been uploaded but only Dave can do that.
I missed giving credit and stuff so you guys post in here who did what and any other notes that should go into the official thread which is located here
Cindy Clayton (BOB member since 2002-06-11)
Hi,
you can find the Credit in the code (Header).
The reason I posted the latest version is not that the code as been changed but is that I integrated some documentation in a PDF for those people that need to distribute the Add-In to user and learn them how to use it. Hope it helps.
Credit summary:
OlivierV: First conversion addin for PDF only with a “basic”-GUI + documentation…
Avaski: Integration of XLS and TXT conversion and GUI redesign.
Have fun with it !
Olivier
OlivierV (BOB member since 2002-10-15)
Thanks Olivier. The add-in thing isn’t always intuitive so it will help to have the instructions with the download. Save questions here later!
Cindy Clayton (BOB member since 2002-06-11)
OK It’ll be my pleasure to answer.
Cheers!
Olivier
OlivierV (BOB member since 2002-10-15)
hi,
I installed the Addin and it works fine, but since installing the Addin I'm facing a problem while trying to create a Macro or edit an existing VBA code . It gives an error when i press create macro saying , "Cannot create VBA Macro". Also when i try to open VB editor for my existing report(created thru a procedure). it gives an unhandled exception error and whole BO window closes :reallymad:
if anyone has any clue to this , pls reply
regds
hyder
Hyder (BOB member since 2003-03-26)
Olivier,
your add-in is working fine, but unfortunately iot doesn’t solve the main problem which is that if you try to export as a text all the data contained within graphs will be lost.
I don’t know if you have noticed, or tried to do something about it…
Looking at the Object model, it looks like you can list all the graph, and get their headers, but the only list of values you can get come from the dataproviders.
Let me know if you find a way around this.
Olivier Masse 
(BOB member since 2002-08-29)
Hyder,
sorry about the problem but we didn’t face it during our tests.
So the question is: “Does the problem disapear when you unselect it via TOOLS --> Add-Ins ?”
Did you registered other Add-Ins or made any change in the code ?
Cheers!
Olivier
OlivierV (BOB member since 2002-10-15)
Olivier, to be honnest I didn’t looked at that before you told me. To export as text we use the ExportAsText method from the BO SDK. So if something should be change, it should be over there (anyone from BO in here ? :? ) or rewrite the method … humhum …
Cheers!
Olivier
OlivierV (BOB member since 2002-10-15)
Olivier,
You are right, I believe it has to be modified in the SDK.
The only reason why I was pointing it out was because I have tried recently to build an application which would convert to text without getting rid of the graphs and it wouldn’t work.
All I could get were the fields name from the graphs but not the data.
Olivier Masse (BOB member since 2002-08-29)
.txt files are text, that is it, you cannot have any formatting. If you want to retain graphs you need to use rtf files. You could add another option to convert to rich text. I wouldn’t change the current conversion to text, that can be useful in creating data files.
Scott Bowers (BOB member since 2002-09-30)
Don’t get me wrong Scott, I never said that the addin wasn’t useful, but most of our reports contain more graphs than tables so you end up with only a third of the information…
Olivier Masse (BOB member since 2002-08-29)
I guess what I was trying to say is you will never get anything but text when you save as text, no matter what, you are limited by the format of the file type, not the conversion bo does. You will need to use another format to get graphs, like RTF.
Scott Bowers (BOB member since 2002-09-30)
Scott,
Even Rtf doesn’t convert graphs.
The reason why we were trying to save it as text was because some of our clients wanted to recieve the reports in a txt format. I guess to use it with Excel later on.
the whole thing should work better with the new release of BO, I understand that you get a Export to Excel which exports everything: tables, graphs, etc…
Olivier Masse (BOB member since 2002-08-29)
Hi,
The Add-in works perfectly fine in converting to Xcel. The Format though is not retained after conversion.
Has anybody got any idea or suggestion pls let me know.
regds
Hyder
[Moderator edit to remove duplicate posts]
Hyder (BOB member since 2003-03-26)
Hello Hyder,
you said:
The next BO version should solve the issue if you may believe tehm.
A work around (without my Add-in) is to save it as HTML and open it with excel!!! Yes it’s possible and the layout will stays the same.
Have fun,
Olivier
OlivierV (BOB member since 2002-10-15)
Bump to get this on the list of stuff in the code forum.
Cindy Clayton (BOB member since 2002-06-11)
Yes, it can be done with excel, currently I’m saving the report in a temporary html file, then I open it in Excel (not visible), raise a “save as” dialog to let the user choose filename and location, save it as native excel and kill temporary html file.
The format remains more or less the same, I’ve used HTMLTidy to correct html formatting errors, unhandled by Excel.
pabloj (BOB member since 2003-03-27)
Olivier / Avaksi,
Would you have any interest in having your download hosted here on BOB? We’ve put a new process in place to support storing add-ins / code samples, and I noticed you were hosting the document converter utility yourself. If you would like to have the download hosted here, just reply to this post. If you’d rather keep it the way it is, that is certainly acceptable as well.
BOB Downloads (BOB member since 2003-05-05)