ActiveReports for .NET allows developers to save the layout of a report at runtime with the SaveLayout method. However, the overloads for the SaveLayout method use different encoding methods. The SaveLayout(string) method uses UTF-8 encoding. The SaveLayout(stream) method uses UTF-16 encoding. This becomes a problem when loading a report saved with the stream overload if the LoadLayout(stream) is not used.

The following code allows both the string and stream overloads to work.

private void btnSave_Click()
 {
       //Save Report to Stream
       System.IO.MemoryStream stream = new System.IO.MemoryStream();
                   
       ActiveReport1 rpt = new ActiveReport1();
       rpt.SaveLayout(stream);
       stream.Position = 0;
  
       System.IO.StreamReader reader = new System.IO.StreamReader(stream);
       string text = reader.ReadToEnd();
                   
       System.IO.StreamWriter writer = System.IO.File.CreateText(Application.StartupPath + @"/report.rpx");
       writer.Write(text);
       writer.Close();
 }
  
 private void btnLoad_Click()
 {
       DataDynamics.ActiveReports.ActiveReport rpt= new DataDynamics.ActiveReports.ActiveReport();
       System.IO.MemoryStream stream = new System.IO.MemoryStream();
       System.Text.UnicodeEncoding unicodeEncoding = new System.Text.UnicodeEncoding();
       System.IO.StreamWriter writer = new System.IO.StreamWriter(stream, unicodeEncoding);
       StreamReader sr = new StreamReader(Application.StartupPath + @"/report.rpx", System.Text.Encoding.UTF8);
                   
       string sRPT = sr.ReadToEnd();
       sr.Close();
       writer.Write(sRPT); 
       writer.Flush();
       stream.Position = 0;
                                     
       try
       {
             rpt.LoadLayout(stream);
             rpt.Run();
             this.viewer1.Document = rpt.Document;
       }
       catch(System.Exception ex)
       {
             MessageBox.Show(ex.ToString());
       }
 }