MS reporting services limiting number of rows - sql-server-2008

I have a report working well where I extract the number of logins per user. Each login takes up one row on the report.
I have date parameters and my DB goes back a year. However it seems the report will only show 40/50 rows despite a report expecting to deliver, say, 250 for the amount of times I logged in.
Is there some setting in reporting services that limits the number of rows delivered. Can't find it anywhere..
Thanks.

The answer to your question: nope, as far as I know there's no real equivalent of SQL's TOP 50 statement in SSRS itself.
Some things that come to mind that may be causing your symptoms / can be investigated:
What happens if you run the query for the dataset in SSMS? Be sure to fill in the exact parameters the report's using (if any).
Run the query as a test from SSRS designer. If you're using Visual Studio: right-click the dataset and hit "Query...", then hit the red exclamation mark and fill in any parameters if needed.
Try putting a CountDistinct call (on your dataset) in a textbox somehwere in the report, by itself.
Check the filtering and grouping on your tablixes, perhaps even by looking at the XML source code for the RDL.
Show the parameters in textboxes (oldskool printf debugging! :D) to make sure they're what you expect them to be when the report's run on the Report Server. If they're not: try deleting the report on the server and re-deploying it.
Have a look at the ExecutionLog2 View in the ReportServer database, specifically the Number of Rows returned.
As mentioned in the comments by Atilla: You may also monitor exact SQL SSRS sends to server using SQL Server Profiler.

Related

SSRS - Delay Dataset queries

So, I have my report written and all is well. However now I have deployed to my live environment I have a problem; when the report is initially opened it runs all the dataset queries, as I have a large database the report is taking an age to display.
Is there a way to prevent all queries running when the report is initially opened? Would like to run just a single dataset query the populates my first parameter, so the user can begin to filter the data before selecting "View Report" to run the main dataset query with the parameters applied rather than getting everything the instant the report is opened?
I have tried setting default values in the parameters to reduce the initial data load but this seems to have confused the users, so think a blank report with nothing selected in the parameters to start with would be better.
Thanks
FTD
I assume you have some form of following.
QueryLookupState -- Used to fill dropdownlist etc.
QueryLookupCity -- Used to fill dropdownlist etc.
QueryMain , your main query which uses parameters from above.
You gave default parameters to your report therefore SSRS is using that defaults and running your main query to generate report. Change your main query and default parameters so that your main query bring empty result or main query needs parameters from lookups.
You can look following question and answer for same problem. You need at least one non-default parameter, otherwise SSRS will execute your report when it first opened.

SSRS - filter existing dataset

I have a report that uses parameters. The default parameters are defaulted to contain all available values, so by default the report the contains all possible data.
I want the user to then be able to deselect some of the values in the parameters, and to refresh the charts in the report, so they can drill down to the data that interests them.
But each time the report is refreshed, it runs the query again, slowing down the process.
Is there a way to allow the user to filter the data in the charts, without re-running the query?
I did find this, but it seems that he also didn't get a solution, or I didn't understand how the solution would work.
http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/0f905bdb-b8f2-4d9d-ac5b-e85d2f94f0cf/textbox-action-to-filter-existing-dataset-rather-than-rerun-query
To keep the query from running again, two high level steps must happen:
1) Make sure that your filters(parameters) are not included in the query. The query needs to be identical, no matter what the user has selected for a filter. This is done by moving the filters into the report. You can set them up as the filter on the tablix or on the row groups that are displaying the data.
2) Set up caching for the dataset. The easiest way to do this is by pulling the data set out of the report and create a "Shared Dataset." when you upload that to SSRS, define the dataset caching: maybe set it to last an hour. Connect the report to the shared dataset as well.
The full details of this can fill an article, such as http://www.mssqltips.com/sqlservertip/1919/how-to-enable-caching-in-sql-server-reporting-services-ssrs/ (for an old version of SSRS, but these concepts haven't changed much.)

Terrible performance in SSRS 2012

Is there an issue with SPLIT(JOIN()) functions in SSRS 2012?
Here's why I ask...
I've just set up an SSRS 2012 server. I have an existing report I built in SSRS 2008 R2, which pulls from a 2005 database. I created a new project in MVS 2010 and added the existing rdl.
When I preview the report, the performance is at least 5 times worse than it is when I preview it in MVS 2008. I ran a trace and found that it took quite a while for SSRS to even execute the SP. Once it did, it rendered quickly.
I was trying to think of something that might slow down the SP's execution. The only thing I came up with is that I have a lot of multi-valued parameters I pass into the SP using SPLIT(JOIN()) functions. Have those been replaced by something new in 2012? If not, I don't even know where to start looking for the problem. My initial google searches have turned up nothing.
Has anyone experienced this problem or know of a list of things that worked well in 2008 but not so well in the new version?
I hope this question isn't too vague. Thanks for reading!
EDIT: I feel silly. I just traced the 2008 report execution and it turns out it does the same thing, which I never noticed before. The rendering is really quick after the SP shows up in Profiler. So...I have no clue what the problem could be. Any help would be GREATLY appreciated!
I would just stick with a predicate like:
Where thing in (#Sets)
Where the 'Sets' variable could be from another dataset I created obtained from SQL like:
Select 'Brett' as Name
Union
Select 'Anna'
Union
Select 'John'
Union
Select 'Jenny'
Simple choose to get the data for sets from 'get data from a dataset'. Once the variable is set SQL 2008R2 and higher should do the lifting for you with figuring out the clause of the predicate in expression of Where thing in (#Sets) actually translates to:
Where thing in ('Brett', 'Anna', 'John', 'Jenny')
The primary solution to speeding SSRS reports and decreasing server load is to cache the reports. If one does this (either my preloading the cache at 7:30 am for instance) or caches the reports on-hit, one will find massive gains in load speed.
Please note that I do this daily and professionally and am not simply waxing poetic on SSRS
Caching in SSRS
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms155927.aspx
Pre-loading the Cache
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms155876.aspx
If you do not like initial reports taking long and your data is static i.e. a daily general ledger or the like, meaning the data is relatively static over the day, you may increase the cache life-span.
Finally, you may also opt for business managers to instead receive these reports via email subscriptions, which will send them a point in time Excel report which they may find easier and more systematic.
You can also use parameters in SSRS to allow for easy parsing by the user and faster queries. In the query builder, type IN(#SSN) under the Filter column that you wish to parameterize, you will then find it created in the parameter folder just above data sources in the upper left of your BIDS GUI.
[If you do not see the data source section in SSRS, hit CTRL+ALT+D.
See a nearly identical question here: Performance Issuses with SSRS
Create a UDF which will take a comma (or some other delimiter you want to use) separated list, and return a table you can join on.
https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/amitjet/2009/12/11/convert-comma-separated-string-to-table-4-different-approaches/
Then you can take set up a parameter in your sproc such as #TheList varchar(max)
You should then be able to use it in a JOIN, Use it to create a temp table and then join on that in your query, or use it as a sub-select.
We use this quite often, and found that if you are primarily using values which are Integers, then the returned table should be a table of INT's to increase performance.
Pseudo example:
declare #TheList varchar(max)
set #TheList = ('1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8')
select *
from dbo.MyRecords r
join dbo.udf_CreateArrayTable(#TheList) at on r.RecID = at.RecID

MS access reports

I created a report using wizard and while creating I selected 4 columns for ordering data in ascending orders. It asked for 4 columns and chose 4 columns and after creation I want to change the preference of the second column to other one. How can I do that??
I cannot see anything in the report query or anywhere else
Ignore any ordering in your report's query source. You can discard your ORDER BY from the query because the Access report will use whatever settings you give it for "Sorting and Grouping" instead.
In Access 2003, with your report in design view, choose View -> Sorting and Group from the Access main menu. If your version of Access is different, look for a similar option.
I should think its just as quick to re-run the whole report. However you can edit the Query that the report is built on.
Or make a query, then get the report to run from the query, this means you can easily change it.

Pass dataset to subreport with SQL Server Reporting Services

I'm using SQL Server Reporting Services and the report designer that comes with Visual Studio. I've got a really big report. It's actually so large that Visual Studio hangs (sometimes for hours at a time) or just crashes when I make changes.
There is preciously little I can do to solve the problem, so I've decided to just move the bottom half of the report into a sub-report. So, I started with one enormous, unresponsive report and ended with two small, manageable reports -- surprisingly, this actually works.
One problem: my subreport uses the same data as my main report. Right now, it populates its dataset by re-querying the database. The extra round-trip to the database causes the report to take twice as long to generate; up from 45 minutes to 1 1/2 hours to generate.
I'd like to avoid hitting the database again, and instead use the same dataset in both reports.
How can I share or pass a dataset between a report and subreport?
I think this can help you:
http://www.gotreportviewer.com/subreports/index.html
Supplying data for the subreport - the SubreportProcessing event To
supply data for the subreport you have to handle the
SubreportProcessing event. Note that this event is on the LocalReport
object. You can add an event handler like this:
private void MainForm_Load(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
this.reportViewer1.LocalReport.SubreportProcessing += new SubreportProcessingEventHandler(MySubreportEventHandler);
}
Below is an example for the event handler. In this example
LoadSalesData is defined to return a DataTable.
void MySubreportEventHandler(object sender, SubreportProcessingEventArgs e)
{
e.DataSources.Add(new ReportDataSource("Sales", LoadSalesData()));
}
If your report has multiple subreports you can look at the ReportPath
property of SubreportProcessingEventArgs and supply data for the
corresponding subreport. You may also want to examine the values of
Parameters property of SubreportProcessingEventArgs and only return
the subset of data that corresponds to the subreport parameters, as
mentioned here.
I'm pretty sure you can't. You're probably better off looking for ways to redesign the report entirely so that it's not so large... not to mention the various problems with subreports when exporting to excel.
I have several reports that the SQL is so complex in that it locks up Visual Studio when I try to edit it. In these reports I go straight into the Code view and edit the XML directly, which works. I also do this when Visual Studio mysteriously makes columns slightly wider than I set them at. However, I doubt you'd want to go down this path if you are editing the layout of the report too much.
Instead of running your query in the report, would it be possible to build a table using a stored procedure that both reports use? The first report runs the stored procedure to build the table and then both reports simply query the report. Watch for concurrency problems if the report can be run by multiple users.
Have you tried using a list within a list where both lists use the same dataset and then filter the inner list to display only records linked to the the outer list?
As far as the execution time, 45 minutes seems like an awful long time in the first place. I'm assuming you've done some analysis of the execution plan to verify your query or stored procedure is using meaningful indexes?
Hope this helps,
Bill
You can do it using a dummy parameter:
i. Create a parameter in your main report 'MyData' and tick 'internal'
ii. Set default value of 'MyData' to your data-set
iii. Set the sub-report parameter with the expression
=Parameters!MyData.Value
Hope this helps,
Duncan
If you create a table, you can merge all the cells of the details row and put a subreport as the contents. Then set the parameter of the subreport to the field you want to run the subreport against.
Jason