InTrust 11.6 - Leveraging Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Services Integration for Advanced Reporting

Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Services Integration Overview

InTrust provides two ways to take advantage of SQL Server Reporting Services:

• Automated report generation achieved by setting up task-based workflows in InTrust Manager
  The typical scenario is to configure a scheduled task that runs regularly and includes gathering events to an audit database (done by gathering jobs) and generating reports (done by reporting jobs).
• Interactive report viewing in Knowledge Portal
  This Web console enhances the Reporting Services user experience and streamlines on-demand reporting.

For details about automated workflows, see the Understanding Jobs and Tasks topic. For information about reporting jobs in particular, see the Reporting Job topic.

To get started with interactive reporting, see the Interactive Reporting topic.

Interactive Reporting

Knowledge Portal is a Web-based application that uses Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Service for report generation. You can connect to the Knowledge Portal from InTrust Manager, or from any computer where Internet Explorer runs.

This system is separate from InTrust reporting jobs. The purpose of Knowledge Portal is to provide interactive reporting capabilities, including report generation, custom report creation, scheduling reports and subscribing to them.

If you correctly specified Knowledge Portal’s virtual directory during InTrust setup, Knowledge Portal is available in the Data Analysis node in the InTrust Manager treeview. You can view and edit the Knowledge Portal URL using the Reporting_default_QRS organization parameter via Organization Parameter Editor. When you select this node, the Knowledge Portal URL is opened in the new window, displaying its Welcome page.

To start working with InTrust reports, when on the Reports tabbed pane, click the InTrust report folder.

To learn more about the Knowledge Portal installation and usage, refer to the Knowledge Portal documentation. In particular, to learn how you can benefit from using the Knowledge Portal when analyzing data collected by InTrust, refer to Working with Reports in Knowledge Portal.

Setting Up Reporting Services Data Sources

When InTrust reports are installed during the InTrust setup, several predefined shared data sources are created. After installation, reports related to InTrust are linked to the following data sources:

• InTrust Configuration
• InTrust Audit
• InTrust Alerts

To view reports on the alerts, audit or configuration data, you should configure certain data source to point to a corresponding database. Initial association is made during the setup so that InTrust Audit data source points to the InTrust audit database specified during InTrust installation, and so on. However, you can associate your data sources with other databases.

Sample procedure described in this section helps you associate predefined InTrust Audit data source with your InTrust audit database. You can take similar steps for other data sources.

To associate a data source with an InTrust audit database:

1. Click Data Sources in the left pane and select InTrust Audit data source.
2. In the right pane, select Modify Data Source from the Options to start the wizard.
3. On the Specify Data Source Name step, click Next.
4. On the Select Authentication Mode step of the wizard, specify the SQL Server where the necessary InTrust audit database resides, and select authentication method to be used for database access. Supply access credentials if required.

5. On the Select Database step, select the database you want to be associated with the InTrust Audit data source, for example, IT_AuditDB. If you want to create a new database, click New.
6. On the Select Products step, select InTrust, which is the product that collects data to this database.

7. Finish the wizard.

Security Considerations

You have three options related to credentials used for data source access:

• SQL Server authentication
  Select this to specify SQL Server credentials.
• Windows authentication
  Use this option if Reporting Services and the audit database reside on different computers. The credentials for database access must be specified explicitly in such a configuration.
• Integrated Windows authentication
  Use this option if Reporting Services are running on the SQL server that hosts the audit database.

It is important to understand that Reporting Services make a distinction between data source privileges and report privileges. The privileges of the account you use must be broad enough both for data source access and for report compilation.

Otherwise, for example, the reporting job may be able to read all of the necessary data in the audit database but may not be able to make a report with this data.

Reporting Services grant access privileges through roles. Configure roles directly in the Reporting Services Web interface.

To configure Reporting Services security settings

1. Open the SQL Server Reporting Services home page.
2. Navigate to the necessary item (report or report folder), and open the Properties tab.
3. Use the Security link to modify report access privileges and the Data Sources link to modify data source access privileges.

For more information about Knowledge Portal security configuration, see the Knowledge Portal User Guide.