I'm trying to determine how to open/edit existing SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) 2005 report projects (.rptproj) and reports (.rdl) with Visual Studio 2008, without having to install SQL Business Intelligence Development Studio (BIDS) 2005.
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6616answers:
5
+1
A:
I'm not sure about editing SSRS projects with VS2008, but I know you can use SQL Server 2008 Report Designer. You can create new reports and edit old reports as well. It will be automatically upgraded once you open them in the designer.
http://windowsitpro.com/article/articleid/98925/sql-server-2008s-report-designer-preview.html
jinsungy
2008-10-08 17:51:04
I meant to specify that I was editing existing reports vs. creating new. Thanks for your answer, though!
Troy DeMonbreun
2008-10-08 17:53:16
Like I said in my answer, you can ALSO edit existing reports. Older report formats can be automatically upgraded by opening them in the designer.
jinsungy
2008-10-08 17:55:09
The reports need to stay as SSRS 2005 reports.
Troy DeMonbreun
2008-10-08 17:58:34
ah... good luck..
jinsungy
2008-10-08 18:03:32
A:
Do you just not have access to a copy of VS2005? If so, you can try opening the project in VS2005 Exrpess. Not sure if it will work or not, since I haven't done it or have SSRS projects to test with.
MagicKat
2008-10-08 18:04:12
I'd prefer not to install VS 2008 and DIBS 2005 (basically VS 2005) on the same computer yet be able to edit SSRS 2005 the way I can edit .NET 2.0 code. I'd rather avoid the bloat, SP upgrades, extra mem usage, etc. of having both side by side.
Troy DeMonbreun
2008-10-08 18:08:25
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A:
You cannot. Check this forum posting which has a reponse from Microsoft.
Yes, it was an active decision that the 2008 design evironments would not support continuous backwards compatability but would rather be a one way upgrade. This was not a casual decision and it is understood how it can be an impact.
You can read the entire posting for more details on why you are unable to use VS2008 for SSRS 2005 projects. Very annoying, but I guess I can understand why they had to make that decision. Just about the only reason I have VS2005 on my dev machine now is for Reporting Services projects since our company is not going to be upgrading to SQL Server 2008 anytime soon.
Erikk Ross
2008-10-08 19:21:13
That links appears to 404. I found a more recent copy [here](http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/forums/en-US/sqlreportingservices/thread/9a7a78a0-bf5c-458a-9cb0-bc82004501f7)
culix
2010-03-02 22:53:20
+4
A:
That is just ridiculous.
We are still running SQL2005 here, with no plans to upgrade soon. Given the state of the economy we don't have a lot of cash flow for server upgrades without a really good reason.
The developers have been able to upgrade to Visual Studio 2008, but we have to still keep VS2005 on our machines so we can edit old SSRS and SSIS packages.
At one time we had some developers with THREE versions of Visual Studio on their machines. Can't wait for Visual Studio 2010 to see what they left out in that version, maybe we'll be able to have FOUR versions on our machines. That's not stupid at all!
Mxyzptlk
2009-02-17 19:36:08
Yes, if you don't convert your 2005 projects to 2008, you will have to have three versions of VS.NET on your machines if you upgrade to 2010. It's NUTS.
Dave Markle
2010-04-16 15:01:31
A:
Wow this would be a lot easier to swallow if purchasing VS2008 gave you, by default, rights to all previous versions.
Oh well, long live the internet, the eula, corporate greed and other American inventions...
AFAIK, BIDS is licensed with SQL - if the developers have a CAL for SQL 2005 (or you have a CPU license), they're entitled to use BIDS. It doesn't make it less annoying though.
Sam
2009-08-31 07:03:09