Windows Azure SQL Reporting: using SOAP APIs

Device information settings in SSRS are used to pass parameters to a rendering extension. For more information regarding device information settings in reporting services, see Passing Device Information Settings to Rendering Extensions.

For SQL Reporting, none of the options specified in the above article are feasible. We see a lot of scenarios where we would want to modify these settings, and render/export the report in the format that we are looking for.

For SQL Reporting reports, we can explore the SOAP APIs in modifying these device information settings at the run time. If we have integrated SQL Reporting within our applications, this approach is really easy, by just creating a separate function.

Here are some steps to achieve this:

1. Generate the proxy class for ReportExecution2005.asmx.

   • In the browser, go to the path for your endpoint. For example: https://<INSTANCE_NAME>.report.int.mscds.com/ReportServer/ReportExecution2005.asmx
   • If prompted for credentials, type your SQL Reporting username and password and click Sign In. A WSDL file will be displayed in the browser.
   • Open the Visual Studio Command Prompt and run the wsdl.exe command to generate the proxy class. For example: wsdl /language:CS /n:"ReportExecution2005" https://<INSTANCE_NAME>.report.int.mscds.com/ReportServer/ReportExecution2005.asmx

2. Now you have the file named: ReportExecutionService.cs. Add the file to your Windows Azure Project. You can use a function similar to the one provided below: 

    public void Render_Export()
            {
                ReportExecutionService rs = new ReportExecutionService();
                rs.Url = String.Format("https://{0}:443/ReportServer/reportExecution2005.asmx", ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["SERVER_NAME"]);
                rs.CookieContainer = new CookieContainer();
                rs.LogonUser(ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["USERNAME"], ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["PASSWORD"], ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["SERVER_NAME"]);
   
                byte[] result = null;
                string reportPath = "/SSRSReport/Report5";
                string format = "CSV";
                string historyID = null;
     
                // Setting the deviceinfo parameters
                string devInfo = @"<DeviceInfo><FieldDelimiter>;</FieldDelimiter></DeviceInfo>";
   
                string encoding;
                string mimeType;
                string extension;
                Warning[] warnings = null;
                string[] streamIDs = null;
     
                ExecutionInfo execInfo = new ExecutionInfo();
                ExecutionHeader execHeader = new ExecutionHeader();
     
                rs.ExecutionHeaderValue = execHeader;
                execInfo = rs.LoadReport(reportPath, historyID);
                String SessionId = rs.ExecutionHeaderValue.ExecutionID;
   
                // code snippet to set the DataSource credentials.
                if (execInfo.CredentialsRequired)
                {
                    List<DataSourceCredentials> credentials = new List<DataSourceCredentials>();
                    foreach (DataSourcePrompt dsp in execInfo.DataSourcePrompts)
                    {
                        DataSourceCredentials cred = new DataSourceCredentials();
                        cred.DataSourceName = dsp.Name;
                        cred.UserName = ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["USERNAME"];
                        cred.Password = ConfigurationManager.AppSettings["PASSWORD"];
                        credentials.Add(cred);
                    }
     
                    Console.WriteLine("Setting data source credentials...");
                    execInfo = rs.SetExecutionCredentials(credentials.ToArray());
                }
     
                // Code snippet to render the file to a specified format.
                try
                {
                    result = rs.Render(format, devInfo, out extension, out encoding, out mimeType, out warnings, out streamIDs);
                    execInfo = rs.GetExecutionInfo();
                }
                catch (Exception ex)
                {
                    throw ex;
                }
     
                // Code snippet to write the file to a specific location using FileStream object
                try
                {
                    FileStream stream = File.Create(@"D:\report.csv", result.Length);                
                    Console.WriteLine("File created.");
                    stream.Write(result, 0, result.Length);
                    Console.WriteLine("Result written to the file.");
                    stream.Close();
                }
                catch (Exception ex)
                {
                    Console.WriteLine(ex.Message);
                }
            }
   

3. You can use a config file to store the Username, Password and SQL Reporting server name. The config file will have information as specified below:

    <appSettings>
      <add key="SERVER_NAME" value="SQLReportingServer.reporting.windows.net"/>
      <add key="USERNAME" value="UserName"/>
      <add key="PASSWORD" value="Password"/>    
    </appSettings>
   

4. Modify the values as per your SQL Reporting server details.

5. You might need to extend the default Reporting Services proxy class to enable cookie management, because SQL Reporting uses forms authentication.

For more information about unsupported APIs in SQL Reporting, see https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/windowsazure/gg430132#UnsupportedAPIs

Other references:

• Windows Azure SQL Reporting for Application developers
• SQL Reporting Samples
• Windows Azure SQL Reporting

Any questions around this, feel free to ping me.

Thanks

Chaitanya