Report Designer and Report Item
Hi all
I'm very new to Reporting Services in general. I have played with some samples and even successfully created my own custom Data Processing Extension. Though with some troubles, I managed to published some reports to the Report Server using this Data Processing Extension.
However, I wonder if I can reuse my extension when adding a Report Item in a non-Report project in VS 2005. For example, I have a C# project and it uses the Report Server Web Service to publish rdl files to Report Server. Now my question is how to generate such rdl files? I know there is a sample of how to programmatically generate rdl files. However, if I add a Report item in this C# project, it generates a .rdlc file instead of a rdl file. And I can't seem to launch the same Report Designer (or report wizard). Also, I can't seem to reuse my data extension.
Please advise. Any pointers or help is greatly appreciated.
There are two flavors of Report Designer. The first is designed to work in C# and VB projects, and also web. This flavor of Report Designer ships with Visual Studio 2005, and creates .rdlc files. The other flavor of Report Designer supports Report Projects and creates .rdl files. This flavor of Report Designer ships with SQL Server 2005.
In order to create .RDL files and to use your custom data processing extension, you need the SQL Server 2005 version of Report Designer. You get it when you install SQL Server 2005.
Thanks for your help. I've written a simple C# project based on the sample code in http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/rsprog/htm/rsp_ref_soapapi_service_ak_79mc.asp
I added an empty report item to this C# project (as an .rdlc file). Therefore, I modified this code to publish this .rdlc report to Report Server and it works successfully. I have a few questions though:
1. When I ran the report in Report Manager, it required me to enter my username and password. Is there a way for me to specify Integrated Security somehow?
2. When I specified a datasource for this .rdlc report, it worked with a MS SQL Server source, but I can't seem to specify a query. Is it a known limitation?
3. If I added Object as the new datasource as in the example shown in
http://whidbey.msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/rs_vsrpts/html/1261f8f9-c491-430d-8f1f-7cb7feef2ddd.asp
But instead of using ReportViewer control, I published this .rdlc report to Report Server. It didn't complain, but when I view the report in Report Manager, I got the following error. Is this known as well? Thank you very much!!
An error has occurred during report processing. (rsProcessingAborted) - Cannot create a connection to data source 'DummyDataSource'. (rsErrorOpeningConnection)
- Login failed for user 'Jtam'. The user is not associated with a trusted SQL Server connection.
Deploying a .rdlc file to a Report Server directly is not supported.
If you have an .rdlc file and you want to deploy it to a Report Server the steps are as follows: Create a Report Project, add the .rdlc file to the report project (renaming .rdlc to .rdl) then open the .rdl in Report Designer. Then switch to the Data tab and supply any missing information such as credentials and query. Preview the report and make sure it works, then deploy.
To create Report Projects, you need the Report Designer included in SQL Server.
Does it mean that adding a .rdlc file in a Visual Studio Language project is mainly for the ReportViewer control (for local processing)?
What are the main difference between an .rdlc file and .rdl file? I thought they were pretty much the same.
Thanks
Jenny
Yes, the .rdlc format is meant for the ReportViewer control, in local processing mode.
RDL and RDLC formats have the same XML schema. However, in RDLC files, some values (such as query text) are allowed to be empty, which means that they are not immediately ready to be published to a Report Server. The missing values can be entered by opening the RDLC file using the SQL Server 2005 version of Report Designer. (You have to rename .rdlc to .rdl first.)
RDL files are fully compatible with the ReportViewer control runtime. However, RDL files do not contain some information that the design-time of the ReportViewer control depends on for automatically generating data-binding code. By manually binding data, RDL files can be used in the ReportViewer control.
Note that the ReportViewer control does not contain any logic for connecting to databases or executing queries. By separating out such logic, the ReportViewer has been made compatible with all data sources, including non-database data sources. However this means that when an RDL file is used by the ReportViewer control, the SQL related information in the RDL file is simply ignored by the control. It is the host application's responsibility to connect to databases, execute queries and supply data to the ReportViewer control in the form of ADO.NET DataTables.
Thank you very much for the details. I really appreciate that. Just wondering if there is any online documentation that compares these two formats just as what you have described above.
I know Microsoft supports programmatic generation of C# projects. I wonder if the same applies to Report projects. If so, is it possible for us to launch Report Designer (or even the Report Wizard) programmatically? Or is it possible to programmatically add a Report Item into a Report Project?
Thank you once again!
Hi!
Y have Visual Basic Express 2005 Beta 2 and i can't fint the "Report Designer" it does not appear. How can i activate it?
Regards..
Can you assist me?
I want to do simple reporting using the rdlc format.
I've created a report called rptAdmit.rdlc, and then I created a form called rptAdmit.vb, and placed a reportviewer control linked to the rdlc on it. Is this the only way to do this in in VS 2005? Kind of primitive.
How do I get checkboxes on this .rdlc?
How do I get information that they won't let me put into the page header to repeat on each page? I saw a "repeat" section, but didn't know what to put into it.
What if I want to do some coding on the load event of this report? Do I have to code it all in the reportviewer control, and if so, how and where?
Where can I find a basic tutorial on using these report files appropriately?
I have Crystal in 2005, but I don't want to got there right now. The .rdlc should suffice, but there are some things I can't get it to do.
Your assistance is greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance!
Daniel
The easiest way to do this is to make the font Webdings or Wingdings. The 'a' character in Webdings is a check.
So use a formula like this:
=IIf(Fields!Checked.Value,
"a", "")
