Professional Microsoft® SQL Server® 2008 Reporting Services

Chapter 4. Reporting Services Architecture

In this chapter, you will explore how features in Reporting Services are implemented and exposed. This information is foundational for both administrators and developers. Subsequent chapters in this book build off concepts explored here.

You will start with a look at the reporting life cycle. This provides you the context within which Reporting Services is employed. You will then explore the various applications and utilities associated with Reporting Services.

Following this, you will dig a little deeper into Reporting Services itself by examining the architecture of the Reporting Services Windows service, its components and supporting databases. By the end of the chapter, you will have a solid understanding of how all these pieces come together to deliver Reporting Services' functionality.

This chapter covers:

• The reporting life cycle

• Reporting Services tools

• Reporting Services Windows service

• Reporting Services processors and extensions

• Reporting Services application databases

The Reporting Life Cycle

The reporting life cycle is often described as a process consisting of three sequential phases. A report is first designed and developed in the authoring phase, made accessible to end-users in the management phase, and then placed in the hands of end-users in the delivery phase. These three phases are illustrated in Figure 4-1 and discussed in the following sections.

Figure 4-1. Figure 4-1

Authoring

The authoring phase of the reporting life cycle starts ...