New Data Provider for Azure Cosmos Database

Azure Cosmos DB is a fully managed Microsoft NoSQL database for modern app development, which is growing in popularity. Various APIs are available for connecting to Cosmos DB, as for example SQL API, Cassandra API or MongoDB API. Since we’re already able to connect to MongoDB or Cassandra through their own data providers, we’ll use the SQL API for the provider.

Service Pack 28.001 for List & Label and the Report Server

This is a summary of the major new features and improvements in Service Pack 28.001, including new export features and bar charts for the Web Report Designer. For a detailed list of all changes, see the ServicePack.pdf in your installation or in the Service Pack download section.

Web Report Viewer for Preview in Web Applications

web report viewer desktop

Up until version 27, you were able to use the HTML5 Viewer in your own .NET web applications in order to display a report preview directly in the browser. Interactive user actions such as drill down, filtering data using report parameters and much more were already possible. But the technology that was utilized for this is getting older now, as for example the jQuery framework. With the new Web Report Viewer, we have created a modern, highly compatible replacement, which has been available since version 27 (year 2021).

Deploy Report Server on an Azure Container Instance and using it from an Azure Function

Report Server Azure Container

As we keep getting requests to support calling List & Label from an Azure Function, and – due to several restrictions like e.g. GDI sandboxing – List & Label can’t be used directly in this context, I thought it might be interesting to explore another way to the cloud, this time using the Report Server. Using its REST-API, you can even create reports from an Azure Function. But let’s walk through the process step by step.

Porting to .NET Core: Report Server on New Technology Basis

report server ansichten endgeräte

The Report Server saw the light of day in 2014. At that time, version 1.0 was implemented using the ASP.NET MVC framework and was based on List & Label 19. But as the number of users increased in subsequent versions, so did the requirements and ideas for new features. Some of the customer requests were difficult to realize with the underlying technology. Many developers have certainly been faced with the same question: What should we do next?