64 bit Report Builder 2.0 Installation Issues in SharePoint Integrated Mode

If you wish to upgrade to SSRS Report Builder 2.0 and you are on a 64-bit environment, you may run into this issue when running the April 7, 2009 download:

Text (so it is search-able): Reporting Services Add-in for SharePoint products and technologies is not installed. It must be installed before you can install the SQL Server 2008 Report Builder 2.0 for SharePoint.

If you are like me when you got this error, you first thought reaction is: "but I did! What is going on? I know I have everything installed!".

Relax, it is not your fault. This time (provided you are like me and on a 64 bit platform).

To confirm, check out this thread on Microsoft Connect to confirm your sanity and also vote this issue as a priority. In addition to other users adding their comments about, some have posted work-arounds to the issue. I find a couple of them rather complicated and opted for another method that has thus far suited me very well. Below are the steps:

1. Download the stand-alone install for Report Builder 2.0 and install it on the app server/server hosting SSRS.
2. Go to your site's Central Admin and click on the Set server defaults link

   

3. Modify the Custom Report Builder launch URL. In my example, the URL value is: http://localhost/ReportServer/ReportBuilder/ReportBuilder_2_0_0_0.application

   

4. Publish a Report Data Source or Report Model content type to your site, then from the Create actions on the list, select new report builder report. If you get the 2.0 version, you have installed it and set the Central Admin settings correctly.
5. Once in Report Builder, there is one last setting. Click the round start button in the upper left corner and then select Options. The Report Builder Options will pop open and you will need to fill in the top option with a value so that you can access the data sources from the lists on your SharePoint site.

   

While this works, it is not the most ideal in my mind as the user has to enter the SharePoint site URL, making usage of Report Builder not entirely intuitive. I did find a Report Builder config file in the install directory with an option to set this value - -hopefully making it effective for any launch of the app, however I did not find this to be the case. Any value inputted there was ignored by the application URL, however only recognized by a direct launch of the executable from the install directory.

If I find how to modify this setting server side, I will be sure to post, but for the time being, here is a simple work around for enabling Report Builder 2.0 in 64 bit SharePoint integrated environments.

June 16, 2009 11:13 by Sid
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