SSRS Reporting vs. CRM & SSRS Reporting

Open CRM

Select Reporting

Create a simple Ad Hoc Report

Save and Export to an RDL file

Now do the same report directly using Visual Studio and SQL Reporting Services

Compare the two RDLs. Notice anything different?

I recently had the chance to do this and opened a few programmer eyes. As it turns out CRM offers a few tricks to the trade when it comes to getting what you want out of the system. Now from a programmer's view these might be "cheats" but from an application point of few these are features that every programmer working with Dynamics CRM might want to know about.

So the next time you tap into an expert SQL resource for some SSRS reporting, take a few minutes to talk about the Dynamics CRM platform and the features and functions they might be able to leverage.  

Also never forget that there is a TON of field experience shared within the world of blogs, twitter, linkedin, CRM forums and even facebook.

This week this post peeked my interest.

What to do if you can't publish a report in Microsoft Dynamics CRM