SQL Server BI ExpansionSQL Server BI Expansion

Microsoft has announced new Microsoft SQL Server Report Packs for Microsoft Exchange Server and Microsoft Business Solutions CRM, available for free via download. For Microsoft CRM, for example, a report template was created to list current customers in the pipeline along with details about those customers. Report Packs for additional applications will be offered in the future. These templates of commonly used SQL Server Reporting Services reports can be modified.

Microsoft also announced that Reporting Services Report Builder, a self-service ad hoc query tool for building reports, based on technology recently acquired from ActiveViews, will be included in SQL Server 2005 Beta 3. Users of Report Builder will be able to build reports from a semantic business layer, part of SQL Server Reporting Services, which will hide the complexity of the underlying database schema.

In addition, SQL Server Integration Services, formerly Data Transformation Services (DTS), has been enhanced for SQL Server 2005 Beta 3 to allow customers to integrate data from any location.