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Tutorial: Generating RDL Using the .NET Framework

This tutorial illustrates how to write Report Definition Language (RDL) to a report definition file using the System.Xml.XmlDocument class.,The XmlDocument class provides an XML document object model (DOM) you can use to quickly generate the data structure of an RDL, and helps you to build report definition documents that conform to the RDL specification.

If you need to write XML as raw data without the overhead of a DOM, you can use an System.Xml.XmlTextWriter. The writer provides a fast, forward-only way of generating XML. The System.Xml.XmlTextWriter writes to a stream rather than using an object model such as the XML DOM.

What You Will Learn

During the course of this tutorial, you will complete the following activities:

  • Create an application using the Visual Studio Console Application project template.

  • Add a connection to the AdventureWorks2008R2 sample database.

  • Write code to retrieve a list of fields for the data source.

  • Write code to generate a simple report definition file that can be used to build a report.

Requirements

To complete the tutorial, you must have the following:

  • Microsoft SQL Server 2008 R2 Reporting Services.

  • Microsoft Visual Studio 2008 or a similar Microsoft .NET Framework-compatible development tool.

  • The AdventureWorks2008R2 sample database installed to an instance of SQL Server. The samples are not installed automatically during setup, but you can install them at any time. For information about installing the samples, see Considerations for Installing SQL Server Samples and Sample Databases.

Estimated time to complete the tutorial: 60 minutes