I am converting over 100 reports to SSRS. The product I was using had the ability to create batch jobs that would generate reports on a schedule (for me it was once per day). These reports were fully rendered and stored as files on the Report Server itself which I could then link to with a simple URL from other Web pages. User clicks on the link and bang, the report is there. I am trying to figure out the equivalent of this in SSRS. I would use Snapshots except they are not fully rendered and when a user picks a large one for Excel format it takes a long time for it to render, thus nullifying the desired feature of quick results when the need for the most up to date data is not necessary. Is there a way to have Snapshots auto-rendered into a specific format? Subscriptions seem the obvious choice since they render the report to final file. However there are a couple issues here for me. The Sharepoint output option is not available to me in our environment. So that leaves Email and a Windows Share location. Email is not an option because we don't know who wants to use the reports at the time they are generated. That leaves Windows Share location. Unfortunately, to use a Windows Share you have to use an account that has local login rights to the SSRS Server. In my environment, this is considered a huge security risk and is not allowed. The only option we can find is to have the server administrators add the account/password to a subscription I create which will be painful since this requires them to do it everytime I create a subscrition OR modify a subscription. Are there any other possiblities I am missing? Am I missing something in the issues I've described? Thanks!

It seems your options are very limited. I think you can still use email subscriptions. You can make SSRS subscription to dump the output in a common mail inbox and share it. So that whenever someone wants to see or fetch a report output file they can just go to that inbox using outlook.Thanks, Pulkit Ojha Microsoft Business Intelligence Developer

You could consider running a scheduled SSIS package that rendered the reports for you. there are several examples on the web of using the SSRS web service from an ssis package. I would start with this: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-au/library/ff793463.aspx and there is a blog post/sample code here to: http://msbiblog.wordpress.com/2010/09/24/run-and-export-ssrs-reports-from-ssis-sql-server-2008/

I had completely forgotten about the possibilities of using SSIS. I'm not sure I will be able to do this in my current environment but I will definitely look into it! The centralized mailbox idea is definitely more workable then pre-knowledge of the users and I will keep that in mind as well. Thanks for the suggestions so far!

Another alternative is your own Windows Forms (or ASP.NET) application that incorporates the ReportViewer control. The RV control can be programmed to render to Excel or PDF on demand. Reports can also be URL-rendered. That is, you can request a rendering format in the URL. This means you can write your own scheduled distribution to send out the reports in whatever format you choose.__________________________________________________________________ William Vaughn Author, Mentor, Trainer, MVP Beta V Corporation William Vaughn's blog Hitchhikers Guide to Visual Studio and SQL Server (7th Edition) The Owl Wrangler a fantasy fiction novel Please click the Mark as Answer button if a post solves your problem!

Hi NElliott01, I am afraid this behavior is a limitation in reporting service, please refer to mattpage and William’s professional suggestions. If you have any concern about this, please submit a feedback at http://connect.microsoft.com/SQLServer/Feedback and hope Microsoft improve this feature in the next service pack or product release. Any questions, please feel free to ask. Thanks, Eileen