Creating Reports / Report Designers / Desktop Designers / Standalone Report Designer / Configuration

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Standalone Report Designer Configuration File

The Telerik Report Designer application can be configured through its configuration file. Application configuration files contain settings specific to the application. This file contains configuration settings such as connectionStrings, traceListeners, assembly binding policy (for the .NET Framework version only), and so on. For example, this file can specify a global connection string that can be used by all reports created with the Report Designer:

<connectionStrings>
    <add name="Telerik.Reporting.Examples.CSharp.Properties.Settings.TelerikConnectionString"
        connectionString="Data Source=(local)\SQLEXPRESS;Initial Catalog=AdventureWorks;Integrated Security=SSPI"
        providerName="System.Data.SqlClient" />
</connectionStrings>

or it can define Trace Listeners to log important information for troubleshooting:

  • For .NET Framework version this may be done in system.diagnostics section:

    <system.diagnostics>
    <trace autoflush="true" indentsize="4">
        <listeners>
            <add name="myListener" type="System.Diagnostics.TextWriterTraceListener" initializeData="C:\Temp\Telerik.ReportDesigner.log" />
            <remove name="Default" />
        </listeners>
    </trace>
</system.diagnostics>

  • For .NET version this may be done in Telerik.Reporting section:

    <Telerik.Reporting>
    <traceListeners>
        <add name="myListener" type="System.Diagnostics.TextWriterTraceListener"  initializeData="Telerik.ReportDesigner.Net.log" />
        <remove name="Default" />
    </traceListeners>
</Telerik.Reporting>

In the .NET Framework version, it can hold binding redirect to the latest version of the Reporting engine:

<runtime>
<assemblyBinding xmlns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v1">
    <!--
    <probing privatePath="path-to-the-assemblies"/>
    -->
    <dependentAssembly>
        <!-- Required for interoperability with older versions of Telerik Reporting -->
        <assemblyIdentity name="Telerik.Reporting" culture="neutral" publicKeyToken="a9d7983dfcc261be"/>
        <bindingRedirect oldVersion="0.0.0.0-18.0.24.305" newVersion="18.0.24.305"/>
    </dependentAssembly>
</assemblyBinding>
</runtime>

For more information, see Application Configuration Files.

The configuration files of all Standalone Report Designer versions use UTF-8 encoding. Make sure that your text editor of choice does not override the default encoding when you modify these files, as this can prevent the designers from loading.

Default Configuration for the .NET Framework Standalone Report Designer

The following code example shows the default Telerik.ReportDesigner.exe.config file that is distributed with the Report Designer for .NET Framework.

<?xml version ="1.0"?>
<configuration>
    <configSections>
        <section
            name="Telerik.Reporting"
            type="Telerik.Reporting.Configuration.ReportingConfigurationSection, Telerik.Reporting"
            allowLocation="true"
            allowDefinition="Everywhere"/>
        <section
            name="Telerik.ReportDesigner"
            type="Telerik.ReportDesigner.Configuration.ReportDesignerConfigurationSection, Telerik.ReportDesigner.Configuration"
            allowLocation="true"
            allowDefinition="Everywhere"/>
    </configSections>
    <startup>
        <supportedRuntime version="v4.0" sku=".NETFramework,Version=v4.0"/>
    </startup>
    <runtime>
        <assemblyBinding xmlns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v1">
            <!--
            <probing privatePath="path-to-the-assemblies"/>
            -->
            <dependentAssembly>
                <!-- Required for interoperability with older versions of Telerik Reporting -->
                <assemblyIdentity name="Telerik.Reporting" culture="neutral" publicKeyToken="a9d7983dfcc261be"/>
                <bindingRedirect oldVersion="0.0.0.0-18.0.24.305" newVersion="18.0.24.305"/>
            </dependentAssembly>
        </assemblyBinding>
    </runtime>
    <connectionStrings>
        <add name="Telerik.Reporting.Examples.CSharp.Properties.Settings.TelerikConnectionString"
            connectionString="Data Source=(local)\SQLEXPRESS;Initial Catalog=AdventureWorks;Integrated Security=SSPI"
            providerName="System.Data.SqlClient" />
    </connectionStrings>
    <Telerik.ReportDesigner DefaultWorkingDir="Examples">
    </Telerik.ReportDesigner>
    <!-- Add assembly references -->
    <!--
    <Telerik.Reporting>
        <AssemblyReferences>
            <add name="MyCustomAssembly" version="1.0.0.0" />
        </AssemblyReferences>
    </Telerik.Reporting>
    -->
    <!--
    <system.diagnostics>
        <trace autoflush="true" indentsize="4">
            <listeners>
                <add name="myListener" type="System.Diagnostics.TextWriterTraceListener" initializeData="C:\Temp\Telerik.ReportDesigner.log" />
                <remove name="Default" />
            </listeners>
        </trace>
    </system.diagnostics>
    -->
</configuration>

Default Configuration for the .NET 8 Standalone Report Designer

The following code example shows the default Telerik.ReportDesigner.Net.dll.config file that is distributed with the Report Designer for .NET. A major difference with the designer for .NET Framework is that the Trace Listener for .NET is in the Telerik.Reporting section rather than in the system.diagnostics section as in .NET Framework.

<?xml version ="1.0"?>
<configuration>
    <configSections>
        <section
                name="Telerik.Reporting"
                type="Telerik.Reporting.Configuration.ReportingConfigurationSection, Telerik.Reporting"
                allowLocation="true"
                allowDefinition="Everywhere"/>
        <section
            name="Telerik.ReportDesigner"
            type="Telerik.ReportDesigner.Configuration.ReportDesignerConfigurationSection, Telerik.ReportDesigner.Configuration"
            allowLocation="true"
            allowDefinition="Everywhere"/>
    </configSections>
    <connectionStrings>
        <clear/>
        <add name="AdventureWorks" connectionString="server=(local)\sqlexpress;database=AdventureWorks;integrated security=true;" providerName="System.Data.SqlClient"/>
        <add name="Telerik.Reporting.Examples.CSharp.Properties.Settings.TelerikConnectionString" connectionString="server=(local)\sqlexpress;database=AdventureWorks;integrated security=true;" providerName="System.Data.SqlClient"/>
    </connectionStrings>

    <Telerik.ReportDesigner DefaultWorkingDir="Examples">
    </Telerik.ReportDesigner>
    <Telerik.Reporting>
    <!-- Add assembly references (in .NET6 and later assemblies are resolved by file name) -->
    <!--
        <AssemblyReferences>
            <add name="MyUserFunctions" />
            <add name="MyBusinessObjects" />
        </AssemblyReferences>
    -->
    <!-- Add trace listeners (in .NET6 and later assemblies that contain custom listeners are resolved by file name)-->
    <!--
        <traceListeners>
            <add name="myCustomListener" type="CustomListenersNamespace.CustomListener, CustomListenersAssembly"  initializeData="Telerik.ReportDesigner.custom.log" />
            <add name="myListener" type="System.Diagnostics.TextWriterTraceListener"  initializeData="Telerik.ReportDesigner.Net.log" />
            <remove name="Default" />
        </traceListeners>
    -->
    </Telerik.Reporting>
</configuration>

If you configure a custom Trace Listener, you need to provide in the type the Assembly Qualified Name of the Trace Listener type implementing the abstract class System.Diagnostics.TraceListener. The assembly name CustomListenersAssembly must be specified along with the full type name CustomListenersNamespace.CustomListener. You need also to copy the assembly in the designer's folder, by default [InstallDir]/Report Designer/.NET.

You may use the Trace Listeners in System.Diagnosics like System.Diagnostics.TextWriterTraceListener without the assembly name. The full type name System.Diagnostics.TextWriterTraceListener is sufficient to discover and utilize the Trace Listener.

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