Absolute Path Information Required

[Former Member]

Hello,

We have a piece of software that uses Crystal Reports for the reporting purposes within the software and have done so for 5 years now. We have never come across this problem in 5 years and only one of our customers is having this problem but on two of his computers.

The customer is trying to run any report within our software and as the report is about to be opened up after loading, an error displays saying "Absolute Path Information Required". We have asked the customer to reinstall Crystal Reports (I think we are using a 2005 version) but this was unsuccessful.

This cannot be a problem with our software because any of us testing this have no problems and neither have any of our other customers.

What does the error "Absolute Path Information Required" mean? Please tell me there is a simple solution.

Thank in advance to anyone who can shed some light on this issue.

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hello Greg,

please see if your issue is similar to the one below:

Question:

I have created some CR reports and the problem that I had every time that I tried to run the report I was getting "Absolute Path Information is required". After searching for a while I found that there is

known bug in CR library and the work around for the fix is

setting the registery HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Environment\windir from %SYSTEMROOT% to C:\WINNT.

This solved my problem and my reports were working fine till

I downloaded some hotfixes from Microsoft and now my reports stop working again and I am getting "Absolute path information is required". Could you please let know if the bug has been fixed and how can I resolve this issue. By the way if

I run my application on a computer that has not been updated with new hotfix from Microsoft the my CR reports work fine I get this error with the computers that have the hotfixes

Answer:

I understand that after applying the Microsoft hot fix, you are getting the error u201CAbsolute Path Information is requiredu201D.

It seems that after applying the Microsoft hot fix, the value of the environment variable u201Cwindiru201D is changed back to u201C%SYSTEMROOT%u201D. The issue is actually a Visual Studio .Net environment bug.

There is no fixes available for this issue but as a workaround you can change the u201Cwindiru201D environment variable to u201CC:\Winntu201D in Windows 2000 and Windows NT machine and u201CC:\Windowsu201D for Windows XP and Windows 98 machine.

To set the environment variable please perform the below-given steps.

1.On the computer desktop, right-click 'My Computer' and select 'Properties'.

2.On the 'Advanced' tab, select 'Environment Variable'.

3.In the 'System Variables' section, scroll until you find the 'windir' variable. Highlight 'windir' and select the 'Edit' button. The 'Edit System Variable' dialog box appears.

4.In the 'Variable Value' field, type the appropriate path.

5.For computers using Windows 98, and Windows XP type the path

"C:\Windows"

6.For computers using Windows 2000/NT, type the path

"C:\WINNT"

Please see if the changes recommended fix your issue.

Best regards

Falk

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Thank you very much for that.

It worked a treat! The problem is now fixed.

Once again, thanks.