Posit vs. SAP Crystal

In my humble opinion, if you are working on something related to Statistics, RStudio is your go-to tool. But if you are looking for something in Machine Learning, look out for Python. The beauty is that there are packages now by which you can write Python/SQL in R. Cross-platform functionality like such makes RStudio way ahead of its competition. A couple of chinks in RStudio armor are very small and can be considered as nagging just for the sake of argument. Other than completely based on programming language, I couldn't find significant drawbacks to using RStudio. It is one of the best free software available in the market at present.

Incentivized

Generation of templated reports is the strong suit of SAP Crystal. Allows users to change formats in templates bases on requirement with minimal effort. Automated report delivery requires the user to be aware of sql which cannot be expected from all users. Should support more document export formats and improve the UI for SAP B1 Users

Incentivized

• The support is incredibly professional and helpful, and they often go out of their way to help me when something doesn't work.
• The one-click publishing from RStudio Connect is absolutely amazing, and I really like the way that it deploys your exact package versions, because otherwise, you can get in a terrible mess.
• Python doesn't feel quite as native as R at the moment but I have definitely deployed stuff in R and Python that works beautifully which is really nice indeed.

Incentivized

• Crystal Reports allows us to create a consistent template for all of our reports.
• Crystal Reports and Server allows us to house a repository for all of our reports to make them easy to find and update when necessary.
• Crystal Reports can connect to a wide variety of data sources.
• Crystal Reports can be a little daunting when first implementing. There are a lot of nuances in learning how to truly master this software and it can be frustrating at times.

Incentivized

• Python integration is newer and still can be rough, especially with when using virtual environments.
• RStudio Connect pricing feels very department focused, not quite an enterprise perspective.
• Some of the RStudio packages don't follow conventional development guidelines (API breaking changes with minor version numbers) which can make supporting larger projects over longer timeframes difficult.

Incentivized

• The export of reports to Excel is very cumbersome and the results are difficult to format.
• The design of reports and the graphical features (e.g. charts) feel quite rigid.
• The learning curve for a non-programmer is incredibly steep, making Crystal a specialty tool.

Incentivized

There is no viable alternative right now. The toolset is good and the functionality is increasing with every release. It is backed by regular releases and ongoing development by the RStudio team. There is good engagement with RStudio directly when support is required. Also there's a strong and growing community of developers who provide additional support and sample code.

Incentivized

We have been using this product for so many years and it has truly become a cornerstone to our business processes when it comes to developing and distributing information via reports. We currently have over 500 reports developed to date over about 30 systems and that will continue to grow as user needs change.

For someone who learns how to use the software and picks up on the "language" of R, it's very easy to use. For beginners, it can be hard and might require a course, as well as the appropriate statistical training to understand what packages to use and when

Incentivized

Crystal is very robust, but not always easy to use. It create wonderful looking reports, and so deserves a high rating. However, I have to take a couple of points off for the simple fact that I cannot hand it to a user and expect them to be able to do development with it.

Incentivized

RStudio is very available and cheap to use. It needs to be updated every once in a while, but the updates tend to be quick and they do not hinder my ability to make progress. I have not experienced any RStudio outages, and I have used the application quite a bit for a variety of statistical analyses

Incentivized

Since R is trendy among statisticians, you can find lots of help from the data science/ stats communities. If you need help with anything related to RStudio or R, google it or search on StackOverflow, you might easily find the solution that you are looking for.

Incentivized

The support community can be difficult to navigate. I've also run into issues with my login. The SAP system has a bizarre mechanism for validating users that requires users to have what is called an S-ID. A basic ID may not give you access to all the features in the portal. The limitation may include not being able to perform a simple task like downloading patches and updates. This isn't a big deal for single user license but for teams it can be a pain.

Incentivized

Trainer was patient and thorough in going through the basics and willing to answer questions by email after the initial training

Incentivized

We did it at the individual level: anyone willing to code in R can use it. No real deployment involved.

Just like any other implementation: When designing the differing reports, get end users' input, make sure to design the reports so that they display the information that the company requires, in the best and clearest way possible.

Test, test, test, revise when needed, and, particularly, do sufficient training so users are comfortable using Crystal Reports!

Incentivized

RStudio was provided as the most customizable. It was also strictly the most feature-rich as far as enabling our organization to script, run, and make use of R open-source packages in our data analysis workstreams. It also provided some support for python, which was useful when we had R heavy code with some python threaded in. Overall we picked Rstudio for the features it provided for our data analysis needs and the ability to interface with our existing resources.

Incentivized

Crystal reports is useful in case we want to import data from data base . We can write queries in it but Google Charts require to be implemented in our application using code so crystal reports is better than Google Charts.

Incentivized

RStudio is very scalable as a product. The issue I have is that it doesn't necessarily fit in nicely with the mainly Microsoft environment that everybody else is using. Having RStudio for us means dedicated servers and recruiting staff who know how to manage the environment. This isn't a fault of the product at all, it's just part of the data science landscape that we all have to put up with. Having said that RStudio is absolutely great for running on low spec servers and there are loads of options to handle concurrency, memory use, etc.

Incentivized

• Using it for data science in a very big and old company, the most positive impact, from my point of view, has been the ability of spreading data culture across the group. Shortening the path from data to value.
• Still it's hard to quantify economic benefits, we are struggling and it's a great point of attention, since splitting out the contribution of the single aspects of a project (and getting the RStudio pie) is complicated.
• What is sure is that, in the long run, RStudio is boosting productivity and making the process in which is embedded more efficient (cost reduction).

Incentivized

• It is a decent buy for specific departments in terms of reporting capabilities but updates and cost (frequent) demands are higher with the benefits offered.
• So long as the requirements are not ever changing, with scheduling functionality, it's a handsome tool.

Incentivized