The ConnectionString property has not been initialized

Question

SQL Server 2008 R2 developers edition / Visual Studio 2008 running on Windows 7 64 bit box.

Created a report with embedded data source. Works fine. Plublished report. Can view report in browser just fine.

Then, in VS 2008, right clicked on datasource. Selected "convert to shared datasource". I did this without any errors reported.

Rebuilt report project and deployed. No errors reported.

Ran report from browser, and now I get this error:

   "The ConnectionString property has not been initialized."

Several questions:

1.  How do I fix this error?

And so that I have a better understand of the technology:

2. How do I find the physical location of the RDL & RDS files? (Would i ever need to know this?)

3. Is a "report server" a specialized database server, web server or something else? At a very high level, what I'm trying to understand is what I'll have to do to set up new report servers for clients. Assuming SQL Server is installed, what tool will I use to (a) create the "Report Server"?  (b) make the server public?  (c) And can I simply copy RDL files to the server and (d) the shared data source and edit it?

Answer 1

I discovered the answer to #1. FYI: when deploying the report, I looked at the reported errors and saw there were none. I had not noticed this warning:

"Warning : Cannot deploy data source HFDM to the server because it already exists and OverwriteDataSources is not specified."

To fix:

1. right click on the report project and select "Properties".

2. In left pane, select "Configuration Properties" -> "General"

3. In right pane, expand "Deployment".  Set "OverwriteDataSource" to TRUE.

Close dialog and deployed report again. All is well.

I would still appreciate answers to #2 and #3.

TIA.

Answer 2

Hi Jersey,

For the second question: we can find the report definition (.rdl) file and share data source (.rds) file at the loaction where we save the report server project.

Before answer the third question, I recommend you that take a look at the online-book about Report Server.
  "The Report Server is the main component of a Reporting Services installation. It is implemented as a Microsoft Windows service as well as Web service. Both of the two services work together and constitute a single report server instance. "
For the source article, please click the following link:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-US/library/ms157231(v=sql.100).aspx

So Report Server is added with a Reporting Services installation, we cannot create a new “Report Server” after an installation. We can configure one the Web service URL that users can use to access to the Report Server in Reporting Services configuration manager. What’s more, we can also define multiple URLs for a single Report Server instance.

Regards,
Fanny Liu

---

Fanny Liu

TechNet Community Support

Answer 3

Thank you Fanny.

"we can find the report definition (.rdl) file and share data source (.rds) file at the loaction where we save the report server project."

Sorry, I was not clear. I realize this. What I had meant was, where is the published location?

I'll read the material  you referenced and mark this as answered or submit a followup question.

Answer 4

Thank you Fanny. I have it under control now. I was not understanding that I have to use Report Manager to deploy reports.

<semiRant>

For FWIW, if anyone at MSFT is reading, a lot of your technology is a lot harder to learn (with respect to the very basics) than it needs to be.  For example, look at this tutorial:

Creating a Basic Table Report

Lesson 6

"You have successfully completed the Creating a Basic Table Report tutorial."

All well and good. I now have a report that I can view in the preview pane. But don't you think that I might like to deploy it? Now, I understand that's beyond the scope of this tutorial. But how about some links to another tutorial on deploying reports? (actually, I think it should be Lesson 7.)

Look at it from the point of view of someone that has never used SSRS. A person with a background in web development and maybe C# development or web services is going to be thinking of XCOPY deployment to a server managed by maybe IIS. After all, the reports run in a browser.

Now there's nothing wrong with the way SSRS runs reports or how they are deployed. But there should be an easy to followed guide/tutorial that takes a new developer through all the steps from creating the basic report (the "Hello World" if you will) to deploying the report without having to understand the details of the underlying architecture.

You know, your technology is often quite good, but my guess is between the "101 click-to-find-anything-documentation" and the incomplete installation and configuration, I bet there are a lot of people that get turned off before they even have a chance to really get into what the technology will do for them.

</semiRant>

Answer 5

Setting "OverwriteDataSource" to TRUE solved the issue for me.

Many thanks!