When the Host is not so Perfect

/0 Comments/in /by

Here is something that has recently bit me really bad. Customer requirements called for implementing an in-house report designer to create report definitions. Expired by the VS.NET 2005 Report Designer, we decided to implement a part of the tool as a WYSWYG designer using the design-time infrastructure (IDesignerHost) in .NET 2.0. If you don’t know what I am talking about, read the excellent Dinesh Chandnani’s Perfect Host article to learn more about the .NET designer host support.


To spice up the user experience, we decided to use the Infragistics Windows Forms suite. At runtime, the end user could drag Infragistics UltraTextBox and UltraImage controls and drop them on the design canvas. Everything was working just fine during development (aka my machine). However, once the application was deployed to QA, the WYSWYG designer failed abysmally. After some digging, we realized that the Infragistics controls was performing the same license check as they do when dropped on a Windows Form in VS.NET 2005. Since the Infragistics controls fail to find a design-time license, they throw an exception once the user attempts to site the control and there wasn’t any workaround. We had no other choice but to yank out the Infragistics controls and replace them with the plain-vanilla Windows controls – TextBox and PictureBox.


The moral of this story is to avoid using third-party controls when implementing .NET custom designers to prevent licensing gotchas.

Microsoft’s Performance Management Gambit

/0 Comments/in /by

An interesting article on TDWI about PerformancePoint Server.

PerformancePoint Server Announced

/0 Comments/in /by

As a follow-up to previous post, during the webcast Microsoft announced a new product called PerformancePoint Server due to be released in mid-2007 alongside Office 2007. PerformancePoint will be a convergent product of Scorecard Manager, ProClarity, and Biz# (yes, Microsoft finally let the cat out of the bag about the strictly confidential so far Biz# initiative). The product will be designed as a web-based portal and will offer performance management, planning and forecasting capabilities.


I personally very excited about this new product offering. PerformancePoint will definately help Microsoft to compete better with other heavy-weight BI players, such as Cognos. More information about PerformancePoint can be found on its website.

Microsoft’s Business Intelligence Product Roadmap Webcast

/0 Comments/in /by

Jeff Raikes, President of Microsoft’s Business Division and Lewis Levin, Corporate Vice President of Microsoft’s Office Business Applications Group, will present a Live Meeting webcast at 11 am (PDT) regarding Microsoft’s Business Intelligence product roadmap. Click here to register.

MDX Performance Tips Article

/0 Comments/in /by

I found a short but very useful MDX Performance article on sqlserveranalysisservices.com. I know I am guilty of breaking not once the first rule (Don’t Filter on Member Property Values). Maintained by Richard Tkachuk (Lead Program Manager on the SSAS team), this site offers other interesting tips and insights.

Chris Webb’s Review

/0 Comments/in /by

Chris Webb, whose latest book “MDX Solutions” is a must-read for everyone who’s serious about Analysis Services 2005 and MDX, has written a review for my book “Applied Microsoft Analysis Services 2005”.  Thank you, Chris!

Cumulative hotfix package (build 2153) for SQL Server 2005 is available

/0 Comments/in /by

Microsoft has released a post-SP1 hotfix which addresses various bugs and issues in SQL Server 2005 and its add-on services.  

Create Reports from Any Data Source Using SQL Server Reporting Services Custom Data Extensions

/0 Comments/in /by

DevX published my article “Create Reports from Any Data Source Using SQL Server Reporting Services Custom Data Extensions”. Learn how to develop a custom data extension to bind server reports to ADO.NET datasets.

Custom Report Items (When You Are Too Sexy For Standard Report Items)

/0 Comments/in /by

One of the most exciting (but not well known and documented) extensibility areas of SSRS 2005 is custom report items (CRI). As its name suggests, custom report items allow you to implement your own reporting controls when the standard SSRS report items (textbox, chart, table, matrix, etc.) are not enough. For example, the attached screenshot shows a report that uses a CRI I wrote to show a KPI value graphically.


If you have experience in developing Windows Forms .NET controls, you will feel immediately at home with CRI. In fact, I dare say that you can take the GDI+ source code of any Windows Forms.NET control and convert it easily to an SSRS CRI. As you can imagine, it won’t be long before third-party vendors come up with all sorts of cool SSRS widgets.


If you want to learn more about CRI, check out the PolygonsCRI sample which Chris Hays wrote. It is included with the latest refresh of the SQL Server 2005 samples. I have an article in the works for MSDN Magazine that explains the implementation details of a progress tracker CRI.. I will post an update here when the article is available (most likely July-August issue of MSDN Magazine).