Beginning Microsoft SQL Server 2008 ... - S3 Tech Training

Chapter 17: Reporting for Duty, Sir! A Look At Reporting Services
While the concepts are the same as we’ve seen in a few other places in the book, there are one or two
new things here, so let’s take a look at several key elements to this dialog.
❑ Server name: This one is what it sounds like and is the same as we’ve seen before. Name the server
you want to connect to for this connection, or, if you’re wanting to connect to the default instance
of SQL Server for the local server, you can also use the aliases of “(local)” or “.” (a simple period).
❑ Windows/SQL Server Authentication: Choose the authentication type to connect to your server.
Microsoft (and, I must admit, me too) would rather you used Windows Authentication, but if
your server is not in your domain or if your administrator is not granting rights directly to your
Windows login, then you can use an administrator-supplied SQL Server–specific username and
password (we’ve used MyLogin and MyPassword on several occasions elsewhere in the book).
❑ Connect to a database: Now things get even more interesting. Here you can either continue down
the logical path of selecting a database on the server you have chosen, or you can choose to connect
directly to an mdf file (in which case the SQL Server Express engine takes care of translating
for you).
In my case, I’ve selected the local server and our old friend, the AdventureWorks2008 database.
Go ahead and click OK, and we see a different Data Source Wizard dialog than we did the first time. (See
Figure 17-5.)
Our example only had the connection we just created, but we could, if desired, actually create several
connections, and then choose between them. Note also the summary of the data connection properties
on the right-hand side of the dialog.
Figure 17-5
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