From what I can see there doesn't seem to be a significant difference in report development between the versions. Some enhancements to the GUI and some changes to the environment but overall it looks like a 5.x developer and a 7.x developer won't be doing much different when it comes to developing a report. Same techniques, same code for the most part.

Is that really true?

The biggest change may be in how developer studio functions in 7.1 world. Just learned one and now using the other.

Leah, what are the big differences?

I've heard that Dev Studio 7 creates formless parameter screens, a lot more difficult to edit outside of Dev Studio.

From what I can gather as I didn't do much with 5.3 and how we set up 7.1 is different. Locations of things is set up some different. I'm not familiar with the formless parameter screen terminology.

Our management decided our development would be on the MRE server not on the desk top, so I'm not sure on some items.

Not an expert here for sure. I've been able to build selection based on the Where in the Fex or by setting it up from the HTM page being developed. Decided best to link to reports rather than imbed in the frames created. Maintenance issue mostly.