We have come to the last leg of John Kirkland's journey to learning SQL Server Reporting Services 2012. One thing he loves about this journey is that he didn't only gain a significant amount of technical skills but also gained an advanced understanding of their company's business in general.
And you, the reader, can very well identify with John's experience all throughout the book as we went from developing simple reports to the advanced ones. John is you. And you should congratulate yourself for a job well done.
Being at the center of any technical project that involves data analysis and reporting always imparts the insider knowledge about the business that is often accessible only to the management.
Thus a report developer, or any technical developer for that matter, holds an important role in any organization. People like you have become linchpins to many companies across multiple disciplines and industries.
As business requirements increase in complexity, Microsoft's offerings on their premier reporting platform will also advance to adapt to accommodate the many challenges of corporate reporting. More and more advanced tools and features are being added into the platform with every iteration.
This chapter provides basic information on SharePoint, PowerPivot, and Power View.
We'll lightly tackle the following:
- SharePoint Integration
- Power View SharePoint add-in
- PowerPivot Excel add-in
SharePoint integration with SQL Server Reporting Services was introduced in SQL Server 2005 SP2 (Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 or Microsoft Office 2007 SharePoint Server). One of the obvious benefits of this integration is the convenience of access to the reports.
Some companies have a SharePoint site as their main intranet for internal communication. It's a good idea to integrate reporting with the SharePoint site as a way of consolidating different information in a one-stop site.
If you are interested in the SQL Server Reporting Services 2012 and SharePoint endpoint architecture, read the MSDN blog titled SQL Server Reporting Services 2012 SharePoint integrated mode Endpoints architecture. Here's the shortened link to the article: http://bit.ly/SQLSP.
Let's integrate SQL Server 2012 and SharePoint 2010 or 2013 (SharePoint 2013 is used in this setup).
Before we proceed, please make sure that you've already done the following:
- Install SQL Server 2012 in SharePoint Mode. Here's a quick step-by-step instruction on how to Install Reporting Services SharePoint Mode as a Single Server Farm: http://bit.ly/SQL2012SPMode.
- Install SharePoint 2010 or 2013. SharePoint 2013 is used in this demonstration. The SharePoint and SQL Server are installed on separated boxes in my setup.
- If you are installing SharePoint in an offline Windows 2012 server (not connected to the Internet), read and follow the instructions in SharePoint 2013: Install Prerequisites Offline or Manually on Windows Server 2012 - A Comprehensive Guide, which is found at http://bit.ly/SP2013PreReqfiles.
- Install the Reporting Services add-in for SharePoint 2010 or 2013. The appropriate add-in for your setup can be found at http://bit.ly/SPAddIn.
Please note that SQL Server 2012 Reporting Services, Reporting Services add-in, and SharePoint follow a strict rule on component combination.
Please refer to the following table for your correct combination:
|
Report Server |
Add-in |
SharePoint Version |
|---|---|---|
|
SQL 2012 SP1 |
SQL 2012 SP1 |
SharePoint 2013 |
|
SQL 2012 SP1 |
SQL 2012 SP1 |
SharePoint 2010 |
|
SQL 2012 |
SQL 2012 |
SharePoint 2010 |
For a complete combination list on all other SQL Server and SharePoint versions, please check the Supported Combinations of SharePoint and Reporting Services Components section. Here's the link: http://bit.ly/SupportedCombi.
Once you've completed the setup, you're now ready to configure the integration between the components.