Reporting Services for Exchange, MSCRM

Three new report packs could jump-start design of Web and printed reports from data in Exchange, MSCRM (Microsoft’s Customer Relationship Management application), and financial databases. The report packs work with Reporting Services, a SQL Server component for designing, publishing, and distributing reports from a variety of data sources. Reporting Services continues to expand its role as a shared reporting component for many Microsoft applications, although it is not the only such component.

SQL Server Reporting Services provides native SQL Server support for creation and management of human-readable reports. It will particularly interest organizations distributing reports to large numbers of users on an ongoing basis and Windows software vendors (including Microsoft) who want to publish reports that can easily be read in a Web browser. Reporting Services is a separately installable component of SQL Server available free over the Web, although any use requires a SQL Server license. The new report packs are also free to SQL Server licensees.