Microsoft® SQL Server™ 2008 All-In-One Desk Reference For Dummies®
by Robert D. Schneider, Darril Gibson
V.4.3. Exposing Report Information with Web Services
SQL Server Reporting Services includes the Report Server Web service. Using the Report Server Web service, any client or application can communicate with the report server by using Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) messages.
NOTE
Book IV, Chapter 5 covers Web services in more depth including Web Services being deprecated in SQL Server 2008. The chapter gives an overview of how Web services are used and includes steps on how a stored procedure is made available via Web services.
The Report Server Web service is an XML Web service. The service passes XML Web messages (containing report data) by using a standard SOAP over HTTP interface.
Figure 4-3 shows one possibility for a Report Server Web service. A user is accessing a Web server over the Internet. The Web server requests the data from the Report Server Web service, which is returned in XML format. The Web server then populates pages with the relevant retrieved data.
Figure V.4-3. The Report Server Web service providing XML messages via SOAP.
One of the great benefits of passing XML messages using SOAP over HTTP is that the messages can easily pass through firewalls. The HTTP interface uses the well-known port 80. Because almost every network has port 80 open to allow users to access the Internet, additional firewall ports don't need to be open. If you've ever tried to ...
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