SQL Server Reporting Services: Bug in PageBreakAtStart and PageBreakAtEnd

Found another bug in PageBreakAtStart and PageBreakAtEnd which do not seem to work if the Visibility of the Table or Rectangle is set to an Expression.

Aparently this issues is reported here on microsoft site, but the MS support has closed this issues saying “this behaviour is currently by design”. I cannot understand the design importance of such an absurd BUG.

The workaround for this is to put an outer rectangle which can have the Visibility Expression and the Rectangle/Table with PageBreakAtStart and PageBreakAtEnd can be placed inside this outer rectangle.

These small irritating problems in SQL Server Reports has made me pull my hair.

SQL Server Reporting Services: Report Header cannot show data fields

It seems such a trivial issue, I can’t imagine why SQL Server Reporting Services Team has not addressed this. It seems that this problem was in SQL Server 2000 Reports and is carried through SQL Server 2005 Reports.

Unfortunately, there is no solution available for this and it becomes so irritating not been able to find a solution for this extremely common requirement. Though there are advantages of using Reporting Services, but just because of small issues/bugs like these I am regretting my decision of using SQL Server Reports in the first place.

One workaround to this suggested on many groups/lists is to bind data values to a report item like TextBox and access this report Item in the Header to show the value. The following funciton can be added as a custom code in the report to retrieve the value of any report item.

Public Function GetItemValue(ByVal Items As ReportItems, ByVal item As String) As String

return Items(item).Value

End Function

However, this solution is fairly useless becuase the ReportItem value is only retrieved in the header if the Report Item is on the smae page. So, for example if the TextBox which contains the value is on the first page, then only first page header will contain the value. This actually negates the actual purpose of using the Header/Footer when it can only be used on only single page.

To get rid of the problem, I had to pass all the values which I had to show in Header as Report Parameters.

Javascript Communication between Secure and Unsecure Pages

It seems that Javascript does not work between Secure and Unsecure Pages. I am working on a scenario where my child window which is doing a secure payment transaction (SSL Secure Pages), refreshes a parent window after completing the transactions.

I am using window.opener.document.forms[0].submit() to refresh the parent window. It worked well on the test enviornemnt when all pages in parent and child window were unsecure but as soon as I made pages in child window secure, the javascript could no longer access the unsecure pages.

After a little more testing i’ve observed that javascript will only work between two pages if both pages are either secure or both are unsecure.

Anyway as a result I have to redirct my secure page to an unsecure  remporary page which refreshes my parent window, but when shifting from secure to unsecure page the user will get an internet explorer message “You are about to move to an Unsecure Page, do u want to continue”. I could not get a work around to get rid of this message, though the user himself can trun this message off from his own browser settings.