18 Aug 2014
By Allen
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Tulsa TechFest Presentations

Tulsa TechFest Presentations

Microsoft SQL Server, SSRS,
Thank you to all who attended my sessions at Tulsa TechFest. It was my first time to attend TechFest and I really enjoyed it. I do ask for an email address for downloads, so I can stay in touch to see if you have questions or need help getting the demos to work. I will never sell or share your email info. Business Intelligence Basics: Finding Return on Data This session will you chart the waters through the sea of Business Intelligence (BI) options. IT departments need tools to turn data into useful information for users. Instead of ROI, this…
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14 Oct 2013
By Allen
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Custom Chart Palettes in SSRS

Custom Chart Palettes in SSRS

SSRS,
This article is a follow up to the Cognos article on creating a custom color palette.  Custom palettes are pretty common when companies start to standardize their corporate image across all company communications. Make a copy of your report template. Name it 'MyCorp Chart Report' In the report area, add a chart Right-Click the chart object and choose Properties For Palette, choose 'Custom' In the properties window, not find the custom palette settings. A dialog box appears that allows you to select each color to include in the custom palette.   Below I have set the first color in the palette…
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14 Oct 2013
By Allen
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Customized SSRS reporting template.

Customized SSRS reporting template.

SSRS,
Large reporting projects can be simplified with a good template as a starting point.   Design templates can store the company header with logo, company color palette, font preference and layout. These are lessons learned while developing a reporting library for GE Oil & Gas, a company with very specific rules for their corporate image.  We created one template for Portrait reports, one for Landscape and one for charts  shown above (with corporate colors).   GE even has their own company font.  As a multi-national corporation, they normally need different logos displayed depending on the country where the report is rendered.   That…
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22 Aug 2013
By Allen
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How to configure Reporting Services 2012 for SharePoint 2013 integrated mode

How to configure Reporting Services 2012 for SharePoint 2013 integrated mode

SharePoint, SSRS, , ,
These are my installation notes because I did not find a clear tutorial for configuring SQL Server Reporting Services 2012 on a SharePoint 2013 server in Integrated Mode.  I found lots of SharePoint 2010 articles, but SharePoint has changed and now Reporting Services is actual a Service Application within the SharePoint farm. This post is aimed at setting up a single server development environment.  It assumes you have already installed the following: SharePoint 2013 SQL Server 2012 SP1 (Enterprise or Developer) SQL Server 2012 Reporting Services for SharePoint 1. Install the SSRS Service in SharePoint.  This is best done through…
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04 Dec 2012
By Allen
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What’s New in SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) 2012

SQL Server, SSRS, , ,
Everybody has been bloggin about the new features in SQL 2012, so I thought it would be best to just look at one part of the offering.  SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) has not gotten a much love but there are a few good improvements.  The list is so short, I covered it in one slide while presenting at SQL Saturday #125 in Oklahoma City.  Let's look at each area a little more. SSRS Data Alerts This is definitely a good improvement from the user perspective.   It allows users (OK, they may need help) to set up subscriptions based on…
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28 Aug 2012
By Allen
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Syncronize Reports across SSRS Servers

Syncronize Reports across SSRS Servers

Microsoft SQL Server, SSRS
At SQL Saturday #125 someone asked me for a quick way to push a report out to multiple Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) servers. At the time I had Visual Studio open for a demo, so my first answer was to use Configuration Manager to store all the server addresses and then Deploy to each stored server. Here is a screenshot of the Configuration Manager. The TargetServerURL allows you to configure different server address for each configuration. Of course as soon as I left the session I thought of two more ways to accomplish the same thing. First, if…
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13 Jul 2012
By Allen
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Bulk Update SSRS Subscription Information

Microsoft SQL Server, SSRS, ,
I have a current client who needed to update information in every SSRS Subscription on their production server. The main reason was they were moving domains.  This meant updating user names and pointing the subscriptions to a new file share server where it saves reports. This is a standalone instance of SQL Server 2008 R2 Reporting Services, not in SharePoint integrated mode. It finally dawned on me that there is no bulk management tool for SSRS reports or subscriptions. So until I get time to learn VB.net and build a tool we needed a quick way to view and edit…
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05 Jun 2012
By Allen
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SQL Rally 2012 BI Track Highlights

SQL Rally 2012 BI Track Highlights

SQL Server, SSAS, SSIS, SSRS, , , , , , , ,
When I got back from SQL Rally 2012 a few weeks ago in Dallas, I shoved the notes into my laptop bag and took off for vacation.   I still want to share a few of the highlights of my trip.  These were some excellent speakers and I hope to see them again at future events. Sessions: Tuning Analysis Services Performance by John Welch Presentation John did an excellent job of explaining the basics of the processing options in SSAS. What was interesting was his experience splitting up jobs to increase performance.  Process Full will process all the dimensions and facts…
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09 Dec 2011
By Allen
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SSRS Data Driven Subscription Troubleshooting

SSRS, , , , , ,
Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) 2008 R2 will only allow data driven subscriptions under certain conditions, including data source security and server configuration options.   SSRS Subscriptions always work great and easy in the demos and training classes.  The following is the list of requirements to actually get them to work with in a data driven environment. You must have SSRS configured to run with an 'Execution Account' Data Sources must not have your Data Sources folder hidden with the option 'Hide in tile view'.  If you check that box, you will be unable to select a data for…
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02 Aug 2011
By Allen
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SSRS Adding “Image Not Available” as Alternate Image

SSRS Adding “Image Not Available” as Alternate Image

Microsoft SQL Server, SSRS, , , ,
I just had a requirement to build a report which had images stored in the database. SSRS handles that fine by just setting the image object to 'database' and then selecting the field. The challenge was adding an alternate image or text when there was no image stored in the database. SSRS makes it difficult because there is no method to dynamically change the image type on the image container itself, such as changing from 'database' to 'external' image on a web server. OPTIONS: Store the 'Not Available' image in the table and write a query which pulled only that…
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