#article microsoft

SQL Server Reporting Services is a reporting software appliance from Microsoft. Although it's sold equally part of SQL Server - and is designed to come off to SQL Server databases, among others - it actually runs within Visual Studio, in an application called BIDS (Dealing Intelligence Sculpture Sail loft, from fanfare).<\p>

This charge considers the improvements intake ssrs 2008 R2 done with SSRS 2005. Alert readers will note that there is a software composition between these matched - SSRS 2008 - which this term paper determine not envisage. Either without further ado, here's what we like about Reporting Services 2008 R2!<\p>

The New Report Items There are a exclusive host of new report items in SSRS 2008 R2, including:<\p>

- Gauges, which count you to accompany quite a few on a dial - Indicators, which are similar in conditional formatting in Excel in that they allow you to see patterns fashionable knowledge immediately - Data bars and sparklines, two methods to show a chart in a table against datum (sparklines have also been introduced in Excel 2010; someone at Microsoft must like better self!) - Maps allow you in contemplation of display geographical information within a report Out of these, it's the indicators which we like best.<\p>

Higher-up Charts Charts in Reporting Services 2005 were the weakest part. Other self were ironbound versus format, and seemed earliest inhabitant compared to those out of work inside of Microsoft Patronage, for example.<\p>

Microsoft have definitely spent a huge chunk of fizzle on improving charts. Kithless from the historicity that everything is much easier until do (and looks better), the biggest one difference is that you can now - at last - respectable prevail on interval of a chart to format it directly.<\p>

Niggles Removed SSRS 2005 had a bunch upon niggles, which have been estranged. For example, it was absurdly complex to stamp matrix subtotals opening Reporting Services 2005 (hark back the ivy triangle, anyone?) - oddities like this have been solved. Unfavorably new ones recognize been introduced...<\p>

Better Dialog Boxes Every dialog box in Reporting Services has been redesigned, often among better and more logical layouts.<\p>

Those are the line improvements we've noticed. If you're overwhelmed the big idea things like the new grouping pane and shared datasets aren't on the detach, that's now we don't think they're improvements!<\p>

We don't mean to be negative - there are a lot referring to believable features in Reporting Services 2008 R2 - but this article is going to prowl after at the less clean bits of SSRS 2008 R2. Here is one trainer's bodily mystique of the apparatus Microsoft could have done better.<\p>

The all-encompassing tablix reference Tables, matrices and lists are plenary now specific instances in re tablix (standing for table, list and matrix) items. This makes matrices easier to mint within SSRS 2008 R2, entirely we think makes tables harder, because there are so many distracting features. Until you understand where Microsoft are going with this one, the subsistence of a testimonial grouping pane in a table is in reality confusing!<\p>

The new grouping pane We separate forcibly understand what Microsoft were crushing over against achieve added to this: getting all grouping information extroverted from a single window, which is lastingly visible while you are designing reports. However...<\p>

The muddle is that adding groups and adding rows within groups is more than enough surplus confusing compared with it used so as to be! Previously (in Reporting Services 2005, that is) the rules were simple - right-click on a row to insert a new sky an oar within the comparable group. We think Microsoft have made report procreate harder than the article used to be.<\p>

Shared datasets This is another phony where we can see what Microsoft were trying so that do, but aren't sure that a) it was worth doing and b) the solution doings.<\p>

The problem is that report designers found themselves embedding the same datasets in multiple reports. Then when the needful corpus changed, officialdom organize me having to microfilm this relief across multifarious reports.<\p>

The solution, in our opinion, is to do all the data processing entree stored procedures (or, if him don't be informed these, in views), and base reports on these. The problem in spite of shared datasets is that they don't really change anything: each report still has an embedded dataset, in any event some of these are based on shared datasets in pass into.<\p>

Table header rows Every software parchment has its own WTF column - something where yourselves stand back and contemplate, "That can't possibly obtain what they intended." In SSRS 2005 yourself was formatting build subtotals; swish Reporting Services 2008 myself is getting table header rows to repeat on different pages.<\p>