I just want to clarify one of Brian's points -- we are not planning to do an RTF renderer (a renderer that exports .RTF files). We are hoping, however, to include a Word (.DOC) renderer.
WPF Flow Documents is definitely an interesting request but it won't be in SQL Server 2008. We hope to get to this sometime in the near future.
I'm confused about why you mentioned HTML -- we've had an HTML renderer since day one. Is there something else you're looking for?
Best regards,
Chris
|||Hi Chris,
what we need is not a renderer to create RTF output. We need a complement to the RichTextBox in Windows Forms for creating formatted text on a sheet of paper.
Best regards
Fritz
|||Hey Fritz,
Thanks for clarifying. The feature you describe is also something we are working hard to include in SQL Server Reporting Services 2008 in a future CTP.
Best regards,
Chris
|||I too am intersted in HTML rendering - yes reporting services can render a reportin HTML but I have database info that is escaped HTML that I would like to include in the report - report service BI Studio built reports do not have any function to render these as rich text or anything
Thats what I am looking for
|||That is the feature Chris is talking about - the ability to have textboxes with rich formatting based on html markup.|||I too am keen to see this feature added, its the one feature that is really lagging compared to other reporting engines.
Not the overall export format, the inclusion of a textbox that can be formatted by content data, such as RTF or HTML.
(Even if only limited, as usually in our cases its just for some emphasis such as bold, italic, font color and font size changes)
I really hope you are able to include this feature in this 2008 release (in SQL 2005 would be nice too, but I guess can't expect too much when working on the current dev version)
Thanks
Brian
|||Hi Brian,Thanks for the feedback. We are hoping that this feature will get into 2008. Stay tuned for further updates. Can you elaborate on some of your scenarios that require this functionality? Anything more you can tell us will help us prioritize this feature more appropriately.
Currently, the plan is to support HTML input but not RTF. Is there one markup format that is more important for you?
Best regards,
Chris|||
Hi Chris,
I am gonna chime in on this one, and say that I have a very large client right now that has RTF-formatted data coming straight from their ERP database (not HTML). We have report requirements to display this data, and unfortunately, the only way to do this right now is to use custom code that imports the System.Windows namespace and uses the RichtTextBox class to "parse" the RTF gunk into a readable text value that we return to the SSRS textbox.
It would be nice to have a report item that can display either HTML or RTF formatted data appropriately.
Regards,
|||Our formatted data is currently stored in HTML, however we were considering using RTF given the editing limitations in smart client apps on vista where the dhtml edit control has been limited. We have since worked out ways around this, so it is HTML formatted data for us.
Hope this helps and you are able to get the feature working in this 2008 release.
As we are building smart client apps, the ReportViewer component is critical for us to support this.
If you were after someone to alpha test the report viewer component with this feature, i'd be very keen to participate.
Thanks for the speedy reply,
Brian
|||Chris,
There are a few components around that do some form of conversion between RTF and HTML, so if the report viewer supports the rendering of HTML, then its possible you could use one of them as a workaround to get the formatted content displaying using an extension component in the report, or some preprocessing in SQL (yuk).
It only needs to be a one way conversion to HTML, as there is no edit in reporting ;-)
That said, it would be nicer if the component itself supported it naturally (even if MS ended up doing this behind the scenes...)
Regards
Brian
|||For us the ability to render HTML (at long last) is critical. We use reporting services with Project Server 2007. It is frustrating to have to strip out all of the HTML code prior to displaying the reports. To see an example, get a copy of the Project Server 2007 demo image from your product group and run the Project Server Report pack reports. They don't look very good due to all of the html showing up.|||Hi, Chris. One feature that would be great: Word export from the local reports that use the ReportViewer control.|||
I agree with the need for Microsoft Word as an export format. A Word renderer is mentioned in an overview doc (http://download.microsoft.com/download/a/c/d/acd8e043-d69b-4f09-bc9e-4168b65aaa71/SQLServer2008BI.doc) so it seems it is already in the works for a future CTP or beta:
"Microsoft Office Word: A word processing application that you can use as a format for reports. Use the new, highly requested report renderer for Microsoft Word, which enables you to render SQL Server 2008 Reporting Services reports in Word format."
Additionally, the ability to view and author reports from within Microsoft Office applications such as Word will be much more approachable to most casual business users. My understanding from an announcement back in May at the Microsoft BI conference is that Microsoft acquired a product to gain this capability and intends to include it in SQL Server 2008.
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