First SP for SQL reporting services

BANGALORE: Microsoft Corp. today announced the release of the first service pack (SP1) for Microsoft SQL Server 2000 Reporting Services. Reporting Services is an open and extensible reporting platform that can increase business insight by providing real-time information from any data source to any device.

Reporting Services SP1 is available to SQL Server 2000 customers free via Web download and includes enhancements that increase functionality, performance and security. Key features of SP1 include support for exporting reports to Excel 97 and 2000, improvements in the PDF rendering extension for pagination and matrix performance, and control over series and data point styles in charts. These changes enable companies to get even more out of their SQL Server 2000 investments.

Since its launch in January, there have been more than 75,000 downloads of Reporting Services by customers looking for an easy way to deliver critical business information. With Reporting Services SP1, customers can continue to experience enterprise-level performance, flexible and dynamic reporting options, and outstanding ease of use at no additional cost.

Reporting Services combines a powerful report generation engine with manageability features that make it easy to provide compelling reports to end users. By leveraging a familiar design environment, Reporting Services also enables companies to free up limited developer and database administration resources to be spent on other projects, which creates a more efficient and cost-effective reporting system.

Initially Microsoft had plans to offer reporting services with the next version of SQL Server, code-named Yukon. However due to delay in its launch the company decided to carry on with the launch of reporting services with the current version, informed an online report.