Interview Questions?

1) What are the different kinds of SSRS Reports?

• Reports can be categorized into operational and analytical reports. The distinction is based on the source of data and level of analysis facilitated by any particular report. Operational reports are based on OLTP sources and are static reports and Analytical reports are based on OLAP sources and generally facilitate drill-down and drill-through for analysis. Technically, SSRS reports can be categorized into parameterized, linked, snapshot, cached, etc...

2) What are parameterized reports? What are cascading parameters in SSRS reports?

• Reports that accept parameters from users to fetch and report data conditionally, are known as parameterized reports. When you have multiple parameters in a report and values of different parameters are dependent and populated dynamically based on the value of parent parameters, it's known as a cascading parameter.

3) How would you go about developing a SSRS report?

• General development methodology for a SSRS report is to start by creating a data source. Based on the data source create one or multiple datasets as needed for parameters and the body of the report. Add required controls from the toolbox which would act as a container for the fields in the dataset. Format the controls added to the report body.  Verify and validate the report and finally deploy the report.

4) What is a dataset and what are the different types of datasets?

• A dataset is similar to a query definition, which is executed when the report is executed. Datasets are of two types: Shared and Embedded. An embedded dataset is private to the report in which it exists and shared datasets can be shared across reports.

5) Would you store your query in a SSRS report or a Database server? State the reason why.

• Storing SQL queries directly in text format in the dataset, should be avoided. Ideally it should be stored in a stored procedure in the database server. The benefit is that the SQL would be in a compiled format in a SP and brings all the benefits of using an SP compared to using an ad-hoc query from the report.

6) What is Tablix?

• A Tablix can be seen as a control with combined capabilities of a table and a matrix, which facilitates asymmetric and flexible, row and column level, static and dynamic groupings.

7) How would you access SSRS reports deployed on report server?

• Reports Manager is the most straight-forward way to access SSRS reports deployed on report server. Apart from executing the reports, it is the main administration console for SSRS server to manage reports.

8) Have you used the Report Viewer control / web part? What are the limitations?

• The report viewer control / web part is the basic control to integrate SSRS reports with external applications. Using these interface applications can link and display SSRS reports within the application. The parameters toolbar in these controls have a limited programmable interface to decorate and blend it with the theme of the application.

9) Which is the latest version of SSRS and what are the new enhancements?

• SSRS 2008 R2 is the latest RTM version of SSRS. Rich data visualizations, better programming functions for lookup and aggregation, improved performance and better control over exported data are some of the major enhancements.

10) What is Report Builder?

• Report Builder is an ad-hoc report authoring tool primarily targeted to be used by business analysts to facilitate self-service report authoring. Report Builder 3.0 is the latest version available as of date.

11) How would you deploy SSRS Reports using out-of-box functionality and how can you automate SSRS report deployment?

• Business Intelligence Development Studio is generally used to deploy SSRS reports. There is no out-of-box support in SSRS to automate reports deployment, but free third-party products like RSScripter can be used for this.

12) What is drill-down and drill-through in SSRS?

• Drill-down is a mechanism of decomposing summarized information to a detailed level. Drill-through is a mechanism of decomposing the problem by drilling information generally using more than one report
  
   
   
   13)What is the report rendering?
  Report rendering is to call the report from server to application. Report rendering can be possible through different ways Like
  Excel, PDF, CSV,XML, TIFF, HTML Web Archive,DOC
  14) What is the report server?
  Report server is the server where we deploy the report In Other way it’s a holding place for reports. Applications access report server to view the report.
  All the reports are reside with Report Server All other activities pertaining to SSRS is done at Report Server.It acts like work station for reporting tool.
  
  15)Can we use the page total in report body?
  The built in field [&pagenumber] and [&pagetotal] cannot be used in report body as these are applicable in report header or report footer.
  These built in field can be added in footer or header for better representation of the report.
  
  16)What are the different types of report?
  Using BIDS reports can be created in two ways. I.e. two ways to retrieve the data from SQL Server data source.
• TSQL Reports: TSQL Reports are made up of plain SQL Query. Data source in this case is SQL server database engine.
• MDX Reports: MDX reports are created through cubes. For this data source is analysis services cubes.

17)What is report subscription? 

Report subscription is to schedule the resource on particular time and to send a mailer to particular users. A subscription is a standing request to deliver a report at a specific time or in response to an event, and then to have that report presented in a way that you define. Subscriptions provide an alternative to running a report on demand. On-demand reporting requires that you actively select the report each time you want to view the report. In contrast, subscriptions can be used to schedule and then automate the delivery of a report. 

18)What is the RDL file?

      A report definition contains data retrieval and layout information for a report. Report Definition Language (RDL) is an XML representation of this report definition.

19)What are the Matrix reports and what are their uses?

Matrix reports are the reports which used to generate data dynamically i.e. table structure is not static and it can be changed at run time.

20)Can you use a stored procedure to provide data to an SSRS report?
Yes, you can use a stored procedure to provide data to an SSRS report by configuring the dataset to use a stored procedure command type. However, your stored procedure should return only a single result set. If it returns multiple result sets, only the first one is used for the report dataset.

21)What is the main purpose of a report parameter?
The main purpose of a report parameter is to add interactivity to your reports, letting users change the report behavior based on options they select. The report parameter option allows you to show different dimensions in a single report by selecting the options.

22)What is the main purpose of a query parameter?
The main purpose of a query parameter is to filter data in the data source.