Part 12 – Creating and Managing Reports

In the previous post, we created Queries and built query based collections.

In this post, we will create and manage reports. Configuration Manager 2012 now works with SQL Server Report Builder 2.0.

We have to first install the Reporting services point role for the server.

Go to Administration, Site Configuration, Sites, and Add Site System Roles. Select Next, and next again. Select Reporting Services Point and select Next. 

reporting services point

On username, select set.. Select the SMSreports account and select Next.

smsreports user account added

Select Next and Next again to complete the installation of the new role.

reporting services added

Now go to Monitoring, Reporting, Reports. A list of reports becomes available.

reports lots

If you go to Assets and Compliance,  Asset Intelligence, and inventoried software you should see some software listed. If not you may have to wait for awhile for SCCM to build this information from your clients. It can take days! The task runs as a very low priority.

Inventoried Software

Creating a Report

To create a Report select Reports and select Create Report. The type of reports we create will be TSQL reports. WMI reports get pulled from SQL commands. Select the SQL-based Report. In name type in: Memory.

create report wizard

Select Browse next to path. Select Hardware – Memory and select OK. Select Next.

report path

Select Next again to create the report. The report has been created. Select Close.

report created

It will create the report builder application and open it in Internet Explorer. I had to copy the url to get it to launch from Internet Explorer to SQL Studio as it would not work in chrome.

SQL Report Builder Application

Click on Table or Matrix

Table or MatrixSelect Create a Dataset. Select Next. The Data Source Connection is connected to: http://configmgr/ReportServer/ConfigMgr_BP1

Select Next. You will be prompted with entering a User account that has permission to connect to the Database. Enter your credentials and select Next.

Under database view select dbo, Views, v_GS_DEVICE_MEMORY, and select StorageTotal0.

v_GS_DEVICE_MEMORY

Select Next. Select the StorageTotal0, that will put it in the values section. Select Next.

storage total

Select Next again. On the style select Ocean, select Next and the field has been added to the report.

storage total added

The storage field has now been added to this report.

Permission changes to the ConfigMgr website

Defining permissions of the ConfigMgr site can help define what reports and access you would like people to have. Some people may not need access to the entire site in order to do their job.

Go to http://configmgr/Reports/Pages/Folder.aspx the root of your Configuration Manager reporting. Select folder settings. Select the New Role Assignment. Here is where you can define a new role for viewing data on the site.

new role assignment

If you now go to Configuration Manager, Monitoring, Reports, and the All software Companies report, Properties, Security Tab, you can see which users have access to this report.

All software companies

In order to change permissions to this report, you have to break the inheritance of this report, by selecting Inheriting rights from the parent object. Now when you select Add you can see the different permissions you can give to this report.

User Properties

Subscriptions

You can define what reports for users to receive on a regular basis. They allow the depositing of the file on a file server, or if you have exchange installed they can send it to a user via email.

Go to Reports, and select Computers with a specific amount of memory. Right click on the item and select Create Subscription. On file Name type: Memory, on Path type: \\configmgr\share, on Render format select: CSV, Username use: SMSAdmin, enter the password and select Next.

create subscription wizard

On the delivery schedule, select Next.

delivery schedule

You can specifically set in the amount of memory you would like to see:

memory amount

Select 2097000 and select OK. Select Next. The subscription has now been created.

created subscription

If you receive an error that the SQL server agent is not running, go to services.msc and start the SQL Server Agent.

On the next post we will package and deploy software.

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