ActiveReports.NET MCP: Using the Report Builder CLI

Agentic Report Generation With the ActiveReports.NET CLI

In our introduction to the ActiveReports .NET MCP, we looked at how an AI agent can get the product context it needs for ActiveReports development. Now, let's focus on one part of that workflow: building reports.

The report-building capabilities of the ActiveReports CLI give an agent a local, structured way to create and refine Page/RDLX reports. You can start with the result you need rather than a list of controls and properties.

That starting point could be a description, a picture of an existing report, or files from Crystal Reports or another reporting system. In each case, the goal is the same: turn the source material into a native, styled, data-bound RDLX report that your team can review and maintain.

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Build an Interactive Report From a Description

Consider a sales leader who needs a regional performance report. The request might be as simple as this:

Build an executive sales report that shows revenue, growth, and margin by region and product category. Include interactive charts that lead to filtered detail sections. Use our brand colors, and make the report suitable for on-screen analysis and PDF export.

That description gives the agent an outcome, but it leaves many design decisions open. The agent must first understand the data. It can examine the database schema, identify the sales measures and dimensions, and confirm how the business defines growth and margin. It can then plan the datasets, parameters, calculations, and report structure.

From there, the agent can use the CLI to build a dashboard-style Page/RDLX report. The summary can include KPI cards for revenue, growth, gross profit, and margin. A trend chart can show how performance changes over time. Regional and product-category charts can expose the strongest results and the areas that need attention.

The report can also connect the summary to the underlying details. When a user selects a region in a chart, the report applies that value to a parameter and moves to a bookmarked detail section. That section refreshes for the selected region and can show products, transactions, trends, and margin results. The same pattern can connect a product-category chart to its detail view.

This is more than a set of static graphics. The charts, tables, parameters, and navigation are native report features. The result remains an ActiveReports report that developers can open, extend, and include in an application.

Let the Agent Inspect, Render, and Improve Its Work

Creating the first version is only part of the workflow. A report can be technically valid and still have crowded labels, weak visual hierarchy, clipped content, or poor page breaks.

The CLI gives the agent a way to check its work as it builds. It can validate the report structure, load the report with the ActiveReports runtime, and render PDF and image previews. The agent can inspect those previews, find visual problems, and make focused corrections.

For the sales report, it might shorten labels, move a legend, adjust chart dimensions, or give the detail table more room. It can confirm that each chart uses the correct fields and calculations. It can also check the exported report, where interactive behavior becomes a static view of the output.

This creates an authoring loop: build, validate, render, inspect, and refine. The agent is not simply generating a report definition and assuming that it works. It is using the actual output as evidence.

Start From a Picture or an Existing Report

A written description is only one way to begin. Sometimes the clearest specification is an existing report. If you provide a screenshot, scanned form, or PDF, an agent can identify its titles, tables, charts, grouped regions, repeated headers, colors, spacing, and branding. It can then use the CLI to recreate the design with native ActiveReports controls and compare the rendered result with the reference image.

The result will not be a flattened copy of the picture. It can connect to live data, use expressions and parameters, and respond to different record counts.

A picture cannot reveal the original query, formulas, hidden sections, or interaction rules. The agent can identify those gaps and ask for the missing details.

The same approach can help when moving reports from Crystal Reports or another reporting solution. The agent can examine the available source files, exports, queries, formulas, parameters, groups, and related assets. It can map the report's intent to ActiveReports concepts, then use the CLI to build and verify a native Page/RDLX replacement.

Here, we are asking Codex to create a copy of an image of a report with the same data, while simultaneously adapting that report to MESCIUS branding in a single short prompt.

This is an assisted reconstruction, not a one-click conversion. Complex formulas, custom functions, subreports, and differences between rendering models still require review. The agent can handle much of the rebuilding work while keeping the business intent visible.

In both cases, the agent interprets the source material. The CLI provides the local authoring, validation, and rendering tools that turn that interpretation into a working report.

A Local and Reviewable Workflow

Report development often involves sensitive data, connection settings, and business rules. The ActiveReports CLI works with local report files and data connections, so report processing does not have to move to a remote report-building service.

Its structured operations make the work easier to review. The report can be rebuilt from declared inputs, checked into version control, and inspected in the normal ActiveReports tools. Validation results and previews provide evidence before release.

The developer still makes the final decisions. Data access, calculations, unusual data conditions, and migrated business rules all need appropriate review. The CLI provides the agent with a capable execution surface; it does not eliminate the need for product knowledge and developer judgment.

Start With What You Already Have

Describe the report you need. Show the agent an existing design. Or provide the files behind a legacy report.

The starting material can change, but the workflow leads to the same place: a native, styled, validated ActiveReports report that your team can inspect, run, and maintain.

With the ActiveReports .NET MCP providing product-aware guidance and the ActiveReports CLI providing a local report-building workflow, an AI agent can move from understanding the request to delivering the report itself.

Want to Try it Out? Download ActiveReports.NET Today!