Bringing report from higher Build Number to Lower Build Number

In case you bring report from a higher build number to a lower build number, it is expected that RDL may not behave same due to different XML.

An example can be taken if you are bringing a report from AX2012R3CU9 to AX2012R3. Both have different application number. The factor that does matter in this case is the visual studio version support. For AX2012R3CU9 its Visual studio 2013. For AX2012R3, its VS2010 supported.

Thus as you will bring AX report from higher build to lower build, it will be:-

1. Deployed successfully and it will work fine in AX.

   BUT

2. If you want to modify it in current/lower version, it will give you error

    

   As you will right click the report design and you will proceed to modify design, you will be welcomed with and error message as following

    

   

               Here you have two choices

    

1. If you choose Cancel, you will face following error message which is complaining you about VS i.e. RDL file is not supported by current VS version.

    

2. If you choose Ok and you agree that covert RDL file automatically as per current VS version, it will not help you. It will fail to convert to name space with below error message.

All you need to do is, Click on Edit Code(blue link in above image)  are do following 2 changes,

1. Remove the <Report…..> tag and replace it with the appropriate version of supported RDL. In my given example e.g. replace Report Tag with below line

    

   <Report xmlns:rd=”http://schemas.microsoft.com/SQLServer/reporting/reportdesigner” xmlns=”http://schemas.microsoft.com/sqlserver/reporting/2008/01/reportdefinition”>

    

2. Remove <ReportSections>, if these are not supported in old version of RDL files such as Reporting services 2008 do not support this.

   For <ReportSections> remove only the tags, not the data inside of it.

Additional Tip:

You can take any existing report which is already existing in current version of VS. Go to reporting server URL and download RDLL file. Open this RDL in XML view and you can see XML structure supported by this current version of Visual Studio.