Alternating Row Background Color in Reports

Now lets see how to get alternating row background colors in Reports. This is one of the 1^st typical report enhancement you might be doing once you started working on Reporting Services.  See the following report : 

This can be achieved very easily in SSRS with the help of IIF and RowNumber function for a simple report with no groupings.   You can use a background color expression as:

= IIF(RowNumber(Nothing) Mod 2, "White","Gainsboro")

It becomes little complicated in cases of Matrix and when some groupings are involved.  In that case use following expression for the details row within a group:

= IIF(RunningValue(Fields!Some_Field.Value,Count,"Group_Name") Mod 2, "White","Gainsboro")

Here instead of RowNumber function I have used he RunningValue function.  Just remember to replace Some_Field with actual column name and Group_Name with actual Group Name in your report.

RunningValue Function (Reporting Services) – Calculating Running Totals

In one of my previous posts I talked about Calculating Running Totals in T-SQL.  Now I will show you how you can calculate the running totals in Sql Server Reporting Services(SSRS).  Yes, it is very much possible with RunningValue function in SSRS and also very easy compare to doing it in SQL.  

The syntax for RunningValue function goes like this -

RunningValue(expression, function, scope)

• expression : The expression on which to perform the aggregation, for example, [Quantity].
• function : The name of the aggregate function to apply to the expression, for example- Sum.
• scope :The name of a dataset, data region, group or Nothing.

See the table below and RunningTotal column which is Cumulative SUM of Quantity column. 

ShipId	OrderId	ShipDate	Quantity	RunningTotal
1	1	2009-02-01 12:06:16.820	10	10
2	1	2009-02-02 16:16:16.820	15	25
3	2	2009-02-01 13:26:16.820	20	45
4	2	2009-02-03 17:40:16.820	12	57
5	2	2009-02-04 13:05:16.820	15	72
6	3	2009-02-03 14:25:16.820	25	97
7	3	2009-02-04 15:50:16.820	50	147
8	3	2009-02-05 19:40:16.820	30	177
9	4	2009-02-06 15:30:16.820	20	197
10	4	2009-02-07 16:20:16.820	10	207
11	5	2009-02-05 17:05:16.820	35	242

For achieving that in SSRS, add extra column in your Report’s Layout Page and put following expression in it-

=RunningValue(Fields!Quantity.Value, Sum, Nothing)

Yes, it is easy and simple, isn’t it?  But what about when you want the RunningTotals for group of records?  Like for above example you want the Running Totals for each orderId separately.  See the table below :

ShipId	OrderId	ShipDate	Quantity	RunningTotal
1	1	2009-02-01 12:06:16.820	10	10
2	1	2009-02-02 16:16:16.820	15	25
3	2	2009-02-01 13:26:16.820	20	20
4	2	2009-02-03 17:40:16.820	12	32
5	2	2009-02-04 13:05:16.820	15	47
6	3	2009-02-03 14:25:16.820	25	25
7	3	2009-02-04 15:50:16.820	50	75
8	3	2009-02-05 19:40:16.820	30	105
9	4	2009-02-06 15:30:16.820	20	20
10	4	2009-02-07 16:20:16.820	10	30
11	5	2009-02-05 17:05:16.820	35	35

Now for achieving that you need do followings :

• First go to Report Layout page and add a new Group.   Give some name to the group.  If you don’t gave any name the default name would be something like “table1_Group1”.  Just note that.  And add OrderId to “Group On” expression.
• Now change the expression at RunningTotal column as

  =RunningValue(Fields!Quantity.Value,SUM,"table1_Group1")

        Now if you have noticed I have replaced the scope Nothing to Group name “table1_Group1” .

Well after adding the extra group in the report you might see blank spaces after every  OrderId change. If you don’t want those blanks and want continuous report, then go to the property page of the new group added and set Visible to “false”.

Mangal Pardeshi

SQL MVP