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Installing Express 6.1 Web Reports
Technical Note 1584
Last Reviewed 18-Sep-2002

Applies To
Express Software Manager version 6.1

Summary
Express Software Manager 6.1 includes three web reports that are viewable via Internet Explorer. This technical note describes how to install the Express Software Manager 6.1 web reports on a computer that is running IIS on Windows NT 4.0, 2000, or XP.

Web reports use ASP (active server pages) to access Express data and to build pages for viewing in the browser. As a result, web reports must be installed on a machine running IIS. Web reports take advantage of Internet Explorer-specific functionality that is provided in IE 5.0 and above.

Express Software Manager 6.1 Web Reports
Requirements for Running Web Reports
In order to run web reports, you must have the following:

  • Web server— Microsoft IIS version 4.0 or greater.

  • Web Client— Microsoft Internet Explorer 5.0 or greater.

  • Client hardware (recommended) Client— 500 MHz processor or greater, 256 MB RAM or greater.

Installing Web Reports
In order to use Express web reports you have to do the following:

  1. Copy the web reports files to a location that is accessible to IIS or Personal Web Server 4.0.

  2. Configure web reports with connection information for your site (your database server and database).

  3. Provide a way for people to access web reports.

Step 1: Copying Web Reports to an IIS-accessible Location
When you install Express Administrative Console, a folder called WebReports is created in the Express Console folder. The WebReports folder contains all the files necessary to run web reports. Copy the entire WebReports folder (including sub-folders) to a location that is accessible to IIS.

To do this without changing any IIS configuration, simply copy the entire contents of the WebReports folder to the web server’s default home folder (root directory).

For example, the IIS default home folder is C:\Inetpub\wwwroot, so you would copy the WebReports folder to C:\Inetpub\wwwroot.

An alternative approach would be to configure IIS with a new default home folder, using the WebReports folder as that default.

Step 2: Configuring Web Reports Connection Information
Express web reports use a file called cs.asp to store database connection information. Modify the cs.asp file so that it contains connection information appropriate to your site. In particular you need to specify the name of your database server. You may also need to provide your database name and login information for that database.

Note: If you are using the default Express database as configured by the Express Software Manager Setup program, you only need to make one change to the cs.asp file, substituting the name of your database server for the default entry.

The cs.asp file has two arrays, CONNECTION_STRINGS and CONNECTION_DESC.

  • The CONNECTION_STRINGS array holds connection information for one or more databases.

  • The CONNECTION_DESC array holds descriptions of the connections in the CONNECTION_STRINGS array.

You need to change the Data Source value in the CONNECTION_STRINGS array from its default of “SQLSERVER” to the actual name of your database server (the machine running MSDE or SQL Server).

The CONNECTION_STRINGS array contains 6 values:

  • Provider—This is the kind of database to which you are connecting. The default Provider is SQLOLEDB and you should not change this.

  • Initial Catalog—This is the name of the database to which you are connecting. By default this is set to “Express”. If you are using the default Express database you do not have to change this. If you are using a database with a different name, you should change this value to match the name of your actual database.

  • Data Source—This is the name of the database server on which the database resides. Change this from the default of “SQLSERVER” to the actual name of your database server.

  • User ID—This is the user name required to connect to your database. The default User ID is “sa”. If you are using the default Express database, you do not need to change this. If you are using a database that was not created by the Express install program you may need to change this.

  • Password—This is the password needed to connect to your database. The default is an empty string and this does not need to be changed if you are using the default Express database. If your database is configured for a different password you will need to change this.

  • Persist Security Info—This is set to “False” by default. Do not change this value.

Step 3: Providing Access to Web Reports
If you already have a web site and are adding web reports to that site, the easiest way to provide access is to create navigation to the webreports.asp page. This is the starting page for web reports.

You can also provide a direct link to web reports by emailing a link to webreports.asp. For example, if you copied the WebReports folder to the default home folder of the web server, you would send this link (substitute the name of your web server for “<your web server>”):

    Http://<your web server>/WebReports/webreports.asp
A third alternative would be to configure IIS so that web reports is the default page that appeared when someone accessed that web server.

Finding the Web Server’s Default Home Folder (Directory)

  1. Open Control Panel from the Start menu, then open Administrative Tools.

  2. Open Internet Services Manager by double-clicking on the entry titled Internet Services Manager.

  3. Expand the listing for the computer on which you will run web reports.

  4. Select the Default Web Site entry and right-click on it and choose Properties from the context-sensitive menu.

  5. On the Home Directory tab of the Default Web Site Properties dialog box find the Local Path entry. By default the home directory is C:\InetPub\wwwroot. You can check for the existence of this folder using Windows Explorer.

Note: If you do not have an Administrative Tools entry called Internet Services Manager, you may not have IIS installed and running. IIS is not installed on Windows 2000 Professional edition by default.

To determine if IIS is installed and running:

Open Internet Explorer and enter the following in the Address field:

    http://localhost/iishelp/
Press Enter. If IIS is running, this will bring up the IIS documentation.

Related Technical Notes
1579 Installing Express 6.2 Web Reports
9989 Express Software Manager 6.x Technical Notes