How do you get a subreport to render in SSRS?

Question

Hi,

I am wondering if someone can let me know which of the following steps I am doing wrong.

1. Have a blank new report ('Blank')
2. Have an existing report ('Sub1') which has its own data sources and one parameter (int, named 'Likelihood', with a default value). These are in the same project and same folder.
3. Drag the subreport control onto the new report
4. In the subreport control properties, select "Sub1" as the "Use this report as a subreport".
5. In the parameters tab click Add.
6. Try and select a name from the dropdown (it's empty).
7. Enter 'Likelihood' as the name.
8. Enter '1' as the value.
9. Try and preview the report, get 'Error: Subreport could not be shown.' in the preview and 'rsErrorExecutingSubreport] An error occurred while executing the subreport 'SubReport1' (Instance: 0): Object reference not set to an instance of an object.' in the Output (where 'Subreport1' is the name of the control attempting to render the report 'Sub1'.

Things I have tried:

1. Entering '=1' as the value.
2. Adding a parameter of the same type and name to my main report 'Blank'. Leaving Parameters tab blank in subreport control properties. Also tried setting the value of a 'Likelihood' entry to be equal to the parameter on the Blank report ('=Parameters!Likelihood.Value').
3. Setting the name as '@Likelihood' (error about requiring name be CLR compliant).
4. Copying the datasources and tables etc. from the subreport to the blank parent report.

The SubReport control rdl:

<Subreport Name="Subreport1">
    <ReportName>Sub1</ReportName>
    <Parameters>
      <Parameter Name="Likelihood">
        <Value>10</Value>
      </Parameter>
    </Parameters>
    <Top>2cm</Top>
    <Left>2cm</Left>
    <Height>7cm</Height>
    <Width>7cm</Width>
    <ZIndex>1</ZIndex>
    <Style>
      <Border>
        <Style>None</Style>
      </Border>
    </Style>
  </Subreport>

I have encountered many others with similar problems but I have not yet found a solution and would appreciate a point in the right direction.

Answer 1

I realised I'm using a shared dataset on my subreport and others have encountered that issue. I deleted everything in my subreport, but it wasn't until I deleted that dataset that it would render without an error (i.e. a blank page as expected since I deleted everything). With this in mind I played with some settings and come up with the "solution" below.

One "solution" that "worked" for me was:

1. Set the dataset to be non-shared, save, preview (to force the "recache" or whatever).
2. Add an equivalent non-shared dataset on the parent report. Try previewing.
3. Undo your original subreport changes (I literally did a source control undo)
4. Make sure you can still preview your subreport.
5. Delete the dataset on the parent report.
6. It's magically working.

I wish I knew what caused this to start working again and I fully expect it will break again, but I do know that this is what I did and now it works so maybe its a cached reports issue?

This is NOT a solution, but I would be very interested to hear if it helps anyone else as maybe it will help us isolate the issue.