How to version SQL Reports.
I currently have a report project of around 60 reports. These reports are used by 2 different client companies, though they are deployed at different times and they are organised differently on each of the report servers. My issue is usually trying to determine what version of the report is on either server.
The date stamps can be helpful, but often I find if there has been a large gap in deployment between companies, the underlying backend data may not be compatible with new uploaded reports.
We keep the source files in SVN, which are obviously versioned for its purposes...but I would like to be able to version individual rdl files, so when I view them on the report server, I can look at some type of metadata that gives me a version number. I DO NOT wish to put versioning in the report name or in the description field.
Has anyone got some good ideas how I can do this.
The date stamps can be helpful, but often I find if there has been a large gap in deployment between companies, the underlying backend data may not be compatible with new uploaded reports.
We keep the source files in SVN, which are obviously versioned for its purposes...but I would like to be able to version individual rdl files, so when I view them on the report server, I can look at some type of metadata that gives me a version number. I DO NOT wish to put versioning in the report name or in the description field.
Has anyone got some good ideas how I can do this.
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Not sure if I can get my DBAs to agree to it, but looks like a start. All will need is to add an incremental version number and it should be well on the way.
Interesting trigger usage in that article!
So, as it's not build in the only option that I see is to implement it yourself somehow. It could be as easy as adding a small textbox in a footer with a hardcoded version number. Of course that means that you need to change that number manually each time you change the report. Annoying, but it should work.
Perhaps it's an option to use the SVN version number? Although I guess that would mean you need to know the next version before you check it in, hmm, might be chicken/egg issue...