can Crystal Reports report definition be imported from a text definition?

this thread Reverse Engineering Crystal Reports Definition Files explains that it is possible to export a report definition into machin开发者_JAVA技巧e-readable text. Well, great, so after that is there any way to import it back in, presumably after doing some modifications via tools more convenient for the purpose than the wonderful Crystal Reports designer?

Looking at the bigger picture suggested by this question, could a 3rd party designer tool be built for Crystal Reports whose output would be either this exported reports definition or, well, whatever sort of output that we could use to actually run the report later on as if it originated from the Crystal Reports designer itself.

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With Crystal Reports Developer Edition v8 there was a "Report Designer Component" included which gave you access via API to everything that you could access from the program. There were licensing caveats for this api... from the documentation:

These runtime report creation features may only be used and distributed if the appropriate licensing is obtained by paying the required royalty fees. Please contact Seagate Software or visit www.seagatesoftware.com/products/crystalreports for more details on report creation royalties. Below is a specific list of files and API calls that are covered by this restriction.

You should also refer to the license agreement for other restrictions regarding this redistribution of files including competitive products, server-based software and report distribution systems.

Runtime files:

CRAXDRT.DLL CRYSTALWIZARD.DLL

I'm not sure that this is available for the newer versions of Crystal though.

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Possible, yes, if you can decipher the file format, perhaps using the code of one of those export utilities as a starting point.

Legal? Probably not, the file format is proprietary and closed, would probably need to be licensed by SAP.