Chapter 24. Creating flexible subscriptions in SSRS
If you create reports using SQL Server Reporting Services you may get requests—for example, for specific reports with varying formats and criteria to be emailed out to clients on the fifteenth of every month, or created and stored in a shared folder every Monday. SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS) supports subscriptions but can be inflexible and rigid. PowerShell can help IT and SQL Server professionals with flexible report scheduling and delivery that support dynamic parameters and ever-changing user requirements.
In this chapter we’ll look at implementing something similar to a data-driven subscription using a list in a CSV file and PowerShell. What I’ll show you is just an example of how you can implement data-driven subscription in PowerShell from start to finish. Not everyone who is reading this chapter is familiar with SSRS or the SSRS environment, so the first few sections are devoted to explaining what the environment looks like. The formats and names I’ve chosen in this chapter may or may not work for you, but the good thing about this approach is that it’s very flexible. You should be able to easily change any of the names (file, parameter, variable) or formats and adjust your PowerShell script.
