What’s New in Bold Reports 4.2 Release

What’s New in Bold Reports 4.2 Release

Umamageswari Elumalai
Bold Reports
6 min readAug 22, 2022

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Syncfusion is delighted to announce that Bold Reports 4.2 is out now, delivering new support and features. This blog provides an overview of the latest updates. We hope this release flabbergasts you with its new features!

Data Connectors

We have included support for new data connectors for creating data sources and data sets. You can create and update with these data connectors:

  • Amazon Aurora
  • Amazon RDS
  • Amazon Redshift
  • CDATA
  • Elastic Search
  • Google Cloud SQL
Data connectors
Data connectors

Now, you can create data sets from these data sources.

License Message

Server License Message

Previously, a license warning was shown in the Viewer and Designer. As the licensing has to be renewed by the administrator, we show this warning only on the Admin panel. Now, the end user will not see a license warning message inside the application.

We have also improved the placement of the licensing error message. It will now display inside the Manage License tab on the Report Server settings page and UMS settings page.

Manage license in Report Server settings page
Manage license in Report Server settings page
Manage license on UMS settings page
Manage license on UMS settings page

Designer License Message

We have improved the placement of the licensing message, which will be located at the bottom-right corner of the Designer interface.

Designer license message
Designer license message

Viewer License Message

Viewer license message
Viewer license message

Writer License Message

PowerPoint Library message for writer
PowerPoint Library message for writer

Integrated predictive forecasting in paginated reports

Predictive analytics uses statistics and modeling techniques to forecast the path to your business goals, and both see and rectify obstacles.

We have integrated a forecast model into Bold Reports to predict the future trajectory of your data. The forecast model is one of the most popular types of predictive data analytics, using historical data to forecast responses to numerical inquiries such as money and traffic.

Predictive Forecasting on the Preview page
Predictive Forecasting on the Preview page

Search for text in a rendered report

We have added an option to find text, numbers, or dates in a rendered report. The search box will appear at the top of the Report Viewer toolbar pane, as shown in the following image.

Search for text in the rendered report
Search for text in the rendered report

The search box allows you to search for, highlight, and navigate to the next occurrence of a piece of text in a paginated report.

Tags in Report Server

Tags are words or phrases that you can use to give a report extra context. You can add tags to reports saved in the Report Server. With tags, we can easily group and filter a set of reports as needed. For example, if you want to tag all reports relating to quarter 1 sales, you can add “Q1_Sales” as a tag.

We have exposed APIs to work with tags:

  • Add report with tags
  • Update report with tags
  • Get report with specified tag (filter using Tags)
  • Get tags available in Report Server

Webpage

We designed a webpage to showcase your frequently asked questions.

https://www.boldreports.com/faq

FAQ Page

Page for FAQs
Page for FAQs

Navigate Link Page

Navigate Link Page for FAQs
Navigate Link Page for FAQs

Chart Types

We have provided support for range bar, range column, range area, and smooth range area chart types in the chart report item to help you visualize progress toward a goal. These widgets are floating and their size is dependent on two y-values: low and high.

The range bar and range column charts are under the Comparison category.

Range bar and range column charts
Range bar and range column charts

The range area and smooth range area charts are categorized under the Distribution category.

Range area and smooth range area charts
Range area and smooth range area charts

Drag the chart type of your choice from the item panel into the design area to design your report.

CSV response type in Web API

We have provided support to parse the CSV response type in the Web API data source.

CSV response type in Web API
CSV response type in Web API

Barcode Type

We have provided support for the GS1CODE128 barcode type in the 1D Barcode report item.

Barcode type
Barcode type

Zero and Margin Property in Chart Axis

Include the zero property in chart axis scale properties and configure the margin for the chart axis scale.

Zero and margin property in chart axis
Zero and margin property in chart axis

Reset Page Number Property

We have provided an option to configure the reset page number property for Tablix group members.

Reset page number property
Reset page number property

Custom Fonts

Configure custom fonts for the report font properties. We need to configure the custom fonts in the config.json file like in the following.

[
{
"DisplayName": "Roboto-Regular",
"FileName" : "Roboto-Regular.ttf"
},
{
"DisplayName": "OleoScript-Bold",
"FileName": "OleoScriptSwashCaps-Bold.ttf"
},
{
"DisplayName": "OleoScript-Regular",
"FileName": "OleoScriptSwashCaps-Regular.ttf"
}
]
Font style property panel
Font style property panel

Whitespace Property

We have provided support to configure the consume container whitespace property for the report.

Whitespace property
Whitespace property

Export Setup Dialog

Export document settings from the Report Viewer export setup dialog.

Export setup dialog
Export setup dialog

Sort Parameter Values

We have enabled a custom UI option to set report parameter values sort order.

Sort parameter values checkbox

Update Category Details While Updating Report

We have exposed an API for changing the category while updating reports.

Update category details while updating report
Update category details while updating report

FTP Location Export

File transfer protocol (FTP) is one of the scheduling options available for data exporting. FTP is one of the most secure ways to schedule your reports.

We have provided support to store the scheduled reports in a given FTP location from your Azure App Service. By enabling the FTP Location Export in the Scheduler dialog, the scheduled reports will be stored in the given location in the scheduled recurrence interval.

FTP location export
FTP location export

Change file while updating data set

We have enabled the upload data set option in the update data set dialog in the Report Server.

Change file while updating data set
Change file while updating data set

Customize Copyright Information for Emails

You can now customize the copyright information in the emails sent from the Report Server.

The information stored on the Settings page will be shown in the emails.

Copyright information settings page for emails
Copyright information settings page for emails
Copyright information in emails
Copyright information in emails

Restricted Spaces While Creating or Updating Data Set Name

We have restricted spaces while creating or updating a data set name to be compatible with MS Builder.

Update Data Set Dialog

Update data set dialog
Update data set dialog

Conclusion

We are happy to share these updates in Bold Reports 4.2 with you, and we hope you find them useful. Check them out and let us know what you think on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, or Instagram. If you have any questions, leave a comment below. To keep saving time with your reporting solutions, stay tuned to Syncfusion and Bold Reports.

Originally published at https://www.boldreports.com on August 22, 2022.

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