Chapter 12: Extending Outside the Box: Customizing Reporting Services

Overview

Up to this point, we have been using Reporting Services just as it comes out of the box (or off of the installation CD, if you want to get technical). All of our management of Reporting Services features and all of our report execution have been through the Report Manager. Reporting Services and the Report Manager do, after all, provide a very feature-rich environment in their default configuration.

One of the best features of Reporting Services, however, is the ability to extend it beyond its basic operation. In this chapter, we will do just that. We will look at ways to execute reports without using the Report Manager interface. We will also look at ways to manage Reporting Services without using the Report Manager interface. Finally, we will work through an example showing how to change the security mechanism used by Reporting Services.

All of this will give you a brief taste of what Reporting Services can do when you start extending outside the box.