SQL Server Reporting Services without using the Wizard
In my previous article, we created a SQL server report using the wizard. However, the wizard has it's own limitations towards the customization of reports and stuff. Therefore, it would be awesome if the report be generated without use of wizards. Lets get started with the same.
Most of the report development that you do using Microsoft SQL server reporting services, would be using the non-wizard method. This allows more flexibility to your report development.
Open Microsoft Business Intelligence studio, and create a report server project.
Next lets configure the datasources and datasets.
Right click on the "Data sources" folder and add a new data source. Set the connection string to point to your new adventure works database.
Once that is done, right click on the datasets folder, to add a dataset. This is basically the place, where you will configure your query that returns some data, that you want to be displayed in the report.
Select the datasource, that you just created and type in a query. You could also use the "Query Designer" if you want.
After eveything is done, click ok
Now from the toolbox, drag and drop a table control.
From the "Report Data", drag and drop the columns defined in the dataset, that you want in the report.
That's it, click on the preview tab and congratulations, you have made your first Microsoft SQL server report using a non-wizard method.
