Maybe you’ve heard of Windows Azure and SQL Server, and even SQL Server Reporting Services. But what exactly is Windows Azure SQL Reporting? In this introduction, I start by providing an answer to this question. Next, I provide a comparison of SQL Reporting to Reporting Services, so that you can better understand the similarities and differences between a cloudbased and an onpremises reporting solution. At this point, you might still wonder why you would need SQL Reporting instead of using a perfectly good Reporting Services solution, so I also explain some of the advantages of SQL Reporting and describe some common scenarios for which it’s well suited.
1 2 By Stacia Misner Foreword by Daniel Jebaraj 3 Copyright © 2013 by Syncfusion Inc. 2501 Aerial Center Parkway Suite 200 Morrisville, NC 27560 USA All rights reserved. mportant licensing information. Please read. This book is available for free download from www.syncfusion.com on completion of a registration form. If you obtained this book from any other source, please register and download a free copy from www.syncfusion.com. This book is licensed for reading only if obtained from www.syncfusion.com. This book is licensed strictly for personal or educational use. Redistribution in any form is prohibited. The authors and copyright holders provide absolutely no warranty for any information provided. The authors and copyright holders shall not be liable for any claim, damages, or any other liability arising from, out of, or in connection with the information in this book. Please do not use this book if the listed terms are unacceptable. Use shall constitute acceptance of the terms listed. SYNCFUSION, SUCCINCTLY, DELIVER INNOVATION WITH EASE, ESSENTIAL, and .NET ESSENTIALS are the registered trademarks of Syncfusion, Inc. Technical Reviewer: Clay Burch, Ph.D., director of technical support, Syncfusion, Inc. Copy Editor: Courtney Wright Acquisitions Coordinator: Marissa Keller Outten, director of business development, Syncfusion, Inc. Proofreader: Graham High, content producer, Syncfusion, Inc. I 4 Table of Contents About the Author 8 Chapter 1 Introduction to SQL Reporting 11 What Is SQL Reporting? 11 How Does SQL Reporting Compare to Reporting Services? 12 Why Use SQL Reporting? 14 Small Company 14 Large Company 15 Limited Project Lifespan 15 Cloud Application Developer 16 Chapter 2 Getting Started 17 Windows Azure Setup 17 SQL Database Setup 17 Data Migration Options 19 Deploy Database Wizard 19 Database Script 20 Windows Azure Data Sync 21 Data-Tier Application Export and Import 22 Windows Azure Blob Storage Account 22 BACPAC Export 23 Migration into SQL Database 25 SQL Server Integration Services 25 Bulk Copy Utility 27 SQL Reporting Setup 28 Chapter 3 Report Development 29 5 Tools 29 Report Development Fundamentals 30 Report Projects 30 Report Items 37 Expressions 43 Report Parameters 49 Filters 52 Query Parameters 54 Subreports and Drillthrough 54 Interactivity 55 Pagination 60 Report Builder 66 Getting Started Wizard 66 Report Development in Report Builder 67 ReportViewer Control 67 On-Premises Application 67 Windows Azure Application 69 Chapter 4 Report Management 72 Report Deployment 72 Redeployment 73 Data Source Management 73 Execution Log 74 Server Usage Statistics 75 Report Server Properties 76 General Properties 77 Execution Properties 78 Chapter 5 Report Parts 79 6 Benefits of Report Parts 79 Report Part Creation 79 Report Part Deployment 80 Deployment from Report Designer 80 Deployment from Report Builder 82 Report Part Redeployment 82 Report Part Management 83 Report Part Gallery 83 Update Notification 84 Chapter 6 Security 86 Role-Based Security 86 Item Roles 86 System Roles 87 Users 87 Report Server Item Permissions 88 Chapter 7 Report Access 90 Web Service URL 90 Rendering Formats 91 Excel 92 Word 93 MHTML 93 PDF 94 TIFF 94 CSV 94 XML 95 My Reports Folder 96 URL Access 97 7 Report URL 97 URL Access Parameters 97 8 The Story behind the Succinctly Series of Books Daniel Jebaraj, Vice President Syncfusion, Inc. taying on the cutting edge As many of you may know, Syncfusion is a provider of software components for the Microsoft platform. This puts us in the exciting but challenging position of always being on the cutting edge. Whenever platforms or tools are shipping out of Microsoft, which seems to be about every other week these days, we have to educate ourselves, quickly. Information is plentiful but harder to digest In reality, this translates into a lot of book orders, blog searches, and Twitter scans. While more information is becoming available on the Internet and more and more books are being published, even on topics that are relatively new, one aspect that continues to inhibit us is the inability to find concise technology overview books. We are usually faced with two options: read several 500+ page books or scour the web for relevant blog posts and other articles. Just as everyone else who has a job to do and customers to serve, we find this quite frustrating. The Succinctly series This frustration translated into a deep desire to produce a series of concise technical books that would be targeted at developers working on the Microsoft platform. We firmly believe, given the background knowledge such developers have, that most topics can be translated into books that are between 50 and 100 pages. This is exactly what we resolved to accomplish with the Succinctly series. Isn’t everything wonderful born out of a deep desire to change things for the better? The best authors, the best content Each author was carefully chosen from a pool of talented experts who shared our vision. The book you now hold in your hands, and the others available in this series, are a result of the authors’ tireless work. You will find original content that is guaranteed to get you up and running in about the time it takes to drink a few cups of coffee. S 9 Free forever Syncfusion will be working to produce books on several topics. The books will always be free. Any updates we publish will also be free. Free? What is the catch? There is no catch here. Syncfusion has a vested interest in this effort. As a component vendor, our unique claim has always been that we offer deeper and broader frameworks than anyone else on the market. Developer education greatly helps us market and sell against competing vendors who promise to “enable AJAX support with one click,” or “turn the moon to cheese!” Let us know what you think If you have any topics of interest, thoughts, or feedback, please feel free to send them to us at succinctly-series@syncfusion.com. We sincerely hope you enjoy reading this book and that it helps you better understand the topic of study. Thank you for reading. Please follow us on Twitter and “Like” us on Facebook to help us spread the word about the Succinctly series! 10 About the Author Stacia Misner is a Microsoft SQL Server MVP, SQL Server Analysis Services Maestro, Microsoft Certified IT Professional-BI, and Microsoft Certified Technology Specialist-BI with a Bachelor’s degree in Social Sciences. As a consultant, educator, author, and mentor, her career spans more than 25 years, with a focus on improving business practices through technology. Since 2000, Stacia has been providing consulting and education services for Microsoft’s business intelligence technologies, and in 2006 she founded Data Inspirations. During these years, she has authored or co-authored multiple books and articles as well as delivered classes and presentations around the world covering different components of the Microsoft SQL Server database and BI platform. [...]... reports To do this, you need a Windows Azure subscription to which you add the SQL Database and SQL Reporting services Then you create a database in SQL Database and migrate data into it Windows Azure Setup SQL Database and SQL Reporting are separate services available on the Windows Azure platform Windows Azure is a subscription-based, cloud-computing platform hosted by Microsoft Prior to activating...Chapter 1 Introduction to SQL Reporting Maybe you’ve heard of Windows Azure and SQL Server, and even SQL Server Reporting Services But what exactly is Windows Azure SQL Reporting? In this introduction, I start by providing an answer to this question Next, I provide a comparison of SQL Reporting to Reporting Services, so that you can better understand the similarities... available in Reporting Services Instead of a polished user interface, you see a list of links to folders and reports Once you open a report, the experience between SQL Reporting and Reporting Services is very similar One exception is the inability to export a SQL Reporting report to a data feed All other export options found in Reporting Services are available in SQL Reporting 13 Why Use SQL Reporting? ... to include reporting as part of your solution There’s no need to develop a reporting mechanism yourself You can simply add SQL Reporting to your application architecture and easily deliver reporting capabilities to your users 16 Chapter 2 Getting Started Before you can start delivering reports with SQL Reporting, you need to have data available for those reports SQL Reporting can use only SQL Database... subscription to use the computing power delivered by the cloud provider In the case of SQL Reporting, that third party is Microsoft Like its on-premises predecessor, Reporting Services, SQL Reporting is a platform that supports three different types of activities that we call the reporting life cycle: Report development Report management Report access Although SQL Reporting does not itself provide tools... secure reports, and monitor usage SQL Reporting supports report access to users through a portal, direct access by using a URL, or a custom application using a Web service method Users can view a report online, or export it to a variety of other formats, such as Excel and PDF 11 How Does SQL Reporting Compare to Reporting Services? Although SQL Reporting is similar to Reporting Services, it doesn’t have... cache management By contrast, SQL Reporting is a component of the Windows Azure platform that is used as a cloud-based service for a portion of the reporting life cycle In essence, you exchange your onpremise server for a comparable server, or farm of servers, in the cloud Although you continue to build reports using the same tools available for Reporting Services, you cannot customize SQL Reporting reports... appears in the SQL Databases list in the Windows Azure Management Portal, as shown in Figure 1 Here you can see its status, the data center location, the Windows Azure subscription with which it is associated, the server name, the database edition, and its size Figure 1: SQL Databases in Windows Azure Management Portal To view more information about the database, click its name in the SQL Databases... converted SQL Reporting Setup At the time of this writing, you perform the setup of the SQL Reporting server on a separate portal To access this portal, click your user name in the top right corner of the Windows Azure Management Portal and click Previous Portal In the lower left corner of the old portal, click Reporting and then in the center of the browser window, click Create a New SQL Reporting. .. application for reporting Tools The authoring process for SQL Azure Reporting uses the same on-premises tools that are available for SQL Server Reporting Services: Report Designer Report Builder ReportViewer control If you already have Reporting Services in-house, then you can use Report Designer in Business Intelligence Development Studio (BIDS) if you are working with SQL 2008 R2 or SQL Server Data . listed terms are unacceptable. Use shall constitute acceptance of the terms listed. SYNCFUSION, SUCCINCTLY, DELIVER INNOVATION WITH EASE, ESSENTIAL, and .NET ESSENTIALS are the registered trademarks. URL Access 97 7 Report URL 97 URL Access Parameters 97 8 The Story behind the Succinctly Series of Books Daniel Jebaraj, Vice President Syncfusion, Inc. taying on the cutting. everyone else who has a job to do and customers to serve, we find this quite frustrating. The Succinctly series This frustration translated into a deep desire to produce a series of concise