Drill-down is an interactive feature in SSRS RDL reporting that allows users to organize and visualize data efficiently. In this blog, we will explain how to configure a drill-down action in an RDL report using the Bold Report Designer. Before getting into the steps, let’s look at what a drill-down action is.
The drill-down action adds a toggle to the text box report item in a report that lets users view sections of the report by expanding and collapsing them at runtime. For example, you can show or hide a tablix row associated with a group by configuring a toggle option in the group’s text box. On expanding, it will show the data under that group as shown in the Drilldown sample report.
To demonstrate drill-down action, we are going to use the company sales report shown in the following image. You can download the report design from here: https://boldreports.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/01/initial-design.zip.
We’ll show you how to configure a drill-down action in a tablix group to show and hide the Product Sub-Category Name and Sales columns based on Product Category Name on report preview. On expanding, the group will display a detailed view of sales. On collapsing, the group will display a summary of sales.
The data set query used in this report runs against an Adventure Works database.
Design report
Launch the Bold Reports Enterprise server demo site, referring to the steps to upload a report, then edit the report in Report Designer.
The tablix report item in the report is designed with the following group structure.
| Row groups | Column groups |
| Parent group | Product category Child group | Subcategory | Parent group | Order Year
|
Configure the drill-down action
You can configure drill-down actions using the Toggle Item property listed in the report item properties.
Select the tablix report item in the design surface to enable the grouping panel.
Select the SubCat group in the grouping panel. Now, the group properties will be listed in the properties panel.
In the Visible property, set the visibility of the SubCat group to show or hide the group the first time you preview a report:
- Enable the check box to display the group.
- Disable the check box to hide the group.
- To determine the visibility state at run time, set the expression for the Visibility property.
Now, let’s uncheck the check box to hide the group initially.
In the Toggle Item property drop-down list, the available text box report items will be listed. Choose the ProdCat field text box to expand or collapse the SubCat based on product categories.
Note: The text box you use for the toggle must be in a containing scope that controls the item you want to show or hide.
To learn more about initial group visibility and initial toggle state configurations, go through our documentation on drill-down actions.
Report preview
You can preview the report using the built-in Report Viewer. Publish the report and switch to preview mode. The initial state of the report will be as shown in the following image. In the collapsed state, the report displays the total sales of each product category in that year.
To see a subcategories of products and their sales values in detail, expand the group by clicking on the toggle icon.
Conclusion
I hope this blog provided a clear idea on how to configure drill-down actions in an RDL report using the Bold Report Designer. To explore further, go through our sample reports and Bold Reports documentation. I have also attached the generated .rdl file for further reference.
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