Striplines - SSRS 2008 - How do I add custom strip lines with varied intervals?
I have a line chart developed in SSRS 2008 that displays temperature data vs. time/date for a piece of equipment. I would like to also show an indication of the equipment's operation cycle timing (heat up/cool down = 1 cycle). Striplines look ideal for representing this type ofrelation (show bars on the background at cycle intervals). Currently, in the users Excel charts,they use a second line plot to show this relationship. The result is a stairstepped line with a 'step' at the start date of each cycle interval. To me this looks a bit hokey.I have been able to add 'interlacing' (striplines) at automatic intervals, but when I modify the striplines collection manually from the axis properties inBIDS/VS, the custom striplines do not show up.I have searched around on the internet for anything besides BOL for striplines to no avail.Anyone with experience using custom striplines in thier reports? Is it possible?Thanks,Bricebrice
February 18th, 2009 3:00am

Hi Brice,I'm not 100% sure on your scenario here, but if you are trying to create specific striplines and not ones that repeat at some interval, the following properties will help you. Open up the Stripline editor by selecting the axis and then use the IntervalOffset Property to control the "starting point" for the stripline. Then set the stripwidth to be the width that you want the stripline to be along the axis. If you leave the rest of the properties set to their default, that will give you a single strip line. You can add as many of these single striplines in this way to form a custom collection.If that's not what you are trying to do, and instead want them at repeated intervals, let me know and we'll work up another sample.SeanProgram Manager, SQL Server Reporting Services
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February 18th, 2009 6:15am

I could write some code to loop through a dataset and make some striplines and add them to the report. It appears I will have to do some calculationif I only have start and end dates for each of the ranges I want to highlight.Ex (pseudocode): Stripwidth = Minutes(startdate-enddate) -using stripwidth interval type of minute...or something like thatOffset = Minutes(StripStartDate - Date(Min(X-Axis))) - using minutes as the OffsetIntervalType.I think the custom striplineswill work except for the interactivity requirement. I saw an example of how to programmatically add Striplines in the MSChart/WebControl samples. I think this uses the same charts as SSRS.Any tips on how to get the minimum value of scale the X-Axis? I have a particular idea of how I want my users to interact with the report, but I can't quite seem to get there. I have tried using a combination of charts using the line graphand plotting the periods as area/stacked area or columns. I got the stacked area to look like I wanted, but the interactivity would not function properly.The basic idea/scenario is that the temperature (primary Yaxis) will be plotted over a timeseries (X axis)to be shown in a line. In addition, there are 'named ranges' of time that I would like to display on the chart (like a vertical/X axisstripline effect) showing the operating cycles of the equipment (multiple cycles of data may be displayed at once). When the user clicks in the 'area' of a cycle, I would like to drill down to display that cycle only (without having to click directly on the line).I have attempted to draw what the final result would look like and you can see the image here: http://docs.google.com/Doc?id=dcp94dd5_4cxf7bxsv. Please let me know if this is do-able, and if so, what techniquest to investigate.Thanks!Brice
March 11th, 2009 9:14pm

HiI am trying desperately to create a single StripLine on my chart, but no matter what settings i set on the property page, nothing appears on my chart. I would like to have a single vertical StripLine that is for the start date of an activity, so it will be on the Y-Axis of my chart. The X-Axis has values that are the number of customer interactions on each of the dates. The dates are in mm/dd/yy format. I am not sure what I can do to get this to work. I have read through the MSDN instructions and nothing works for me. What am I doing wrong? Or, does this feature really not work?Thanks for any help. - willwill
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March 5th, 2010 1:12am

Sean's answer should be the "right" way to do it but if, for any reason, this doesn't meet your requirements, I have an alternative approach. I struggled with this on a project last year and came up with a work-around that I documented on my blog at http://www.sqlserverbiblog.com/BlogEngine/post/Column-Chart-with-Goal-Threshold-Line.aspxThis technique uses a line chart on the secondary axis. You do have to jump through some hoops to manipulate the min/max range and axis points to sort correctly. I'm not proposing this as the best practice but it does offer an alternative with quite a bit of control. I'll watch this thread as I'm anxious to see what works best in your scenario.Paul Turley, MVP [Hitachi Consulting] SQLServerBIBlog.com
March 5th, 2010 5:38am

Thanks for the reply and possible work-around. It is VERY frustrating though...that I cannot get the StripLine to work as advertised. I did try the steps that Sean offered in his post...but it simply does not work. And, the fact that you had to come up with a work-around makes me suspect that StripLine is an illusion.thanks - willwill
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March 5th, 2010 7:27pm

Hi PaulOne thing that I am having problems with, is that I want to create a vertical Threshold line, along the y-axis.I have a set of dates across the y-axis and the associated data values (that correspond to each date) along the x-axis. The users want to see a vertical line that indicates a specific date and then they'll know which values occured before that date and which values after. Have you ever been able to get a vertical "threshold" line?thanks - willwill
March 5th, 2010 10:17pm

Brice, do you have some example VB-code for me which can be used in the "custom code" of a report.rdl?
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March 11th, 2010 11:18am

Hi Paul I did read through your chart w/ goal threshold line solution & it's very helpful, thanks. Only issue is my data set is SSAS. Any ideas how i could do the same thing with an SSAS data source?? Thanks! Doodles
February 7th, 2011 8:09am

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