Report authoring is perhaps one of the most frequently required activities in an enterprise. Knowledge of report authoring is an invaluable asset when one is looking for a job in an enterprise. Before you can write a report you will have to know where your data is and how to get connected to it from your authoring software. Report authors who are not very comfortable with using data on a back end server could use the more powerful and highly interactive Power View reports, but this requires a developer in your organization to create a model for you to work with. Once the model in place it is super easy to create stunning reports. This is only possible on SQL Server 2012 with the reporting services installed in SharePoint integrated mode.
The following is specific to SQL Server Reporting Services, but this is important for any authoring tool. In the following Visual Studio 2012 is presumed and a web project is to be created to demonstrate the use of Report Viewer Control.
Presently the
Server Explorer has the following items:
If you do not see
Server Explorer you click
View in the main menu and click
Server Explorer as shown:
Presently there is a connection established with the Adventure Works 2012 database on the SQL Server 2012 named
Kailua.
Click
Connect to Server item on
Server Explorer tool bar shown.
The
Add Server window is displayed as shown.
The name of the computer is provided (you provide the name of your computer). Click
OK.
Adding a Data Connection
Click
Connect to Database toolbar item as shown.
Or you can right click
Data Connection and start as well.
Assume that we clicked
Connect to Database.
The
Add Connection window is displayed as shown.
This is because before getting to the database you must first get connected to the server. Notice that the
Microsoft SQL Server (SqlClient) is the default. It can be changed to others by hitting the Change... ellipsis button and following the wizard.
For now accept the default. Click on the handle for
Server Name after hitting the
Refresh button. You see three servers, a SQL Server 2012 (Kailua); a SQL Server 2008 R2 (Maui) and a SharePoint Server.
Click
HODENTEKWIN7\KAILUA to choose the server. The
Add Connection window is updated as shown. We accept the default authentication,
Windows Authentication.
Click on the handle for the
Select or enter a name for the database field to display the drop-down list as shown.
Click
Northwind. It could be another database in your case. Click the
Test Connection button and verify that the connection was successful as shown.
Click
OK on the above message window and click
OK on the
Add Connection window. The new database connection will be added to the Visual Studio 2012’s Server Explorer as shown.
That is all for now.
Mahalo
My new book uses images / screenshots such as the above to guide you through the learning process. The instructions are very simple and most of the steps are described.