Need to create PDF417 bar codes in Crystal and/or SSRS.
Is there a free one that works? If not free, then which is the one that works?
As far as I know, there are no “drop in” modules for SSRS or Crystal to generate PDF417 barcodes ‘on the fly’.
When I needed PDF417 barcodes at a previous employer, I created a custom DLL that I loaded into SSRS, along with some custom code in SSRS to call a function in the DLL which returned a binary stream (bitmap) of the PDF417 that could be used in an Image Box within the SSRS report.
EDIT: Hello, Jim.
EDIT 2: I still keep in touch with my old coworkers, so I have a good idea as to why you are requesting information about this and will try to give as much information as I can without breaching any paperwork that I signed with a different former employer of mine:
I dug out my old source code as a refresher to see what it was that I did for adding PDF417 Barcodes to SSRS without having to spend any money. My programming experience allowed me to program everything from the ground up, relying on a single .NET Library for generating the PDF417 barcode, while the rest of the project was using libraries that I developed in-house.
The relevant part boils down to this:
I developed a .NET library that could be loaded into SSRS at runtime. (Before SSRS would load the SSRS, I had to digitally sign it with a valid certificate.) That Library uses the ZXing PDF Libraries to generate barcodes of different types (Aztec, Data Matrix, QR Code, and PDF417). The RDL references the .NET library and the functions that are in it. In the RDL, I have added an Image field to the RDL and have the image source set to one of the functions within that same .NET library. It passes parameters to it (in my case it is passing a Part #, Job #, Assembly #, and Op Seq #) to the function, which creates a PDF417 Barcode that is formatted in such a way that a barcode scanner attached to the MES Workstation would be able to clock an employee into a job without that employee having to manually go through the process of clicking “Start Production Activity” and having to enter in that information manually.
This was part of a larger project that was developed to help eliminate errors with data entry on the shop floor and included customizations in MES, the Job Traveler RDL, SSRS, and a few other proprietary systems we had that were integrated with Epicor.
The last I heard, my old employer is still using this system (with slight modifications as things change with each Epicor upgrade).