Planning for Browser Support
In Reporting Services, you use a Web browser to view reports and run Report Manager. Not all report functionality is supported by all browsers. This topic describes the browser requirements for Report Manager, feature availability for the supported browsers, authentication requirements, script requirements, and alternative steps and approaches for working around browser supportability issues.
Browser Requirements for Report Manager
To run Report Manager and use Report Manager to view reports, you must use Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 with SP1 or Internet Explorer 7.0. Scripting must be enabled. The computer must be running a Microsoft Windows operating system.
Note
Scripting is enabled by default. However, if you are using Internet Explorer, you can modify script settings in the Security tab of the Internet Options dialog box. In the Security tab, when you select the zone through which you access Report Manager (in most cases, this is the Local intranet zone), you can click Customize Level to enable or disable different types of script functionality.
Browser Requirements and Recommendations for Viewing Reports
To view reports separately from Report Manager, you can choose from a variety of supported browsers. The following table describes feature availability for specific browser types.
Browser type |
Description |
|---|---|
Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 or 7.0 for Windows, with all service packs applied and scripting enabled. |
Internet Explorer is recommended if you want to use all the available report functionality. Although you can use other browsers to view a report, Internet Explorer for Windows is the only browser that is guaranteed to support the complete set of features for working with reports. |
Firefox, Netscape, Safari |
The following features are not supported in third-party browsers:
The following additional features are not available when viewing reports in Safari 3.0:
|
Note
If you are accessing a report server from a Macintosh computer, we recommend that you use Safari. Reporting Services does not support Internet Explorer 5.0 Macintosh Edition. Additionally, Safari 3.1 does not support Windows SharePoint Services 3.0. For more information about browser support in MicrosoftOffice SharePoint Server and Windows SharePoint Services, see Plan browser support (Office SharePoint Server) and Plan browser support (Windows SharePoint Services).
Authentication Requirements
Browsers support specific authentication schemes that must be handled by the report server in order for the client request to succeed. The following table identifies the authentication types supported by each browser, the authentication scheme that each browser uses by default when connecting to a computer that runs a Windows operating system, and whether additional report server configuration is required to support authentication requests from that browser.
Browser type |
Supports |
Browser default |
Server default |
|---|---|---|---|
Internet Explorer |
Negotiated, Kerberos, NTLM, Basic |
Negotiate |
Yes. Default authentication settings work with Internet Explorer. |
Firefox |
Negotiated, NTLM, Basic |
NTLM |
Yes. Default authentication settings work with Firefox. |
Safari |
Basic |
Basic |
No. Reporting Services does not support Basic authentication by default. You must enable Basic authentication and remove the default entries for RSWindowsNegotiate and RSWindowsNTLM. Alternatively, you can also deploy and use a custom authentication module. For more information, see Configuring Authentication in Reporting Services and How to: Configure Basic Authentication in Reporting Services. |
Script Requirements
To use the report toolbar functionality with a report, you must configure your browser to run scripts. Scripts are used in the report toolbar to support zoom, search, refresh, and export operations.
If scripting is not enabled, you receive the following message when you open a report: "Your browser does not support scripts or has been configured to not allow scripts to run. Click here to view this report without scripts". If you choose to view the report without script support, the report is rendered in HTML without report viewer capabilities such as the report toolbar and the document map.
Reporting Services does not return an error if you are using a browser that is incompatible with the default HTML rendering extension. In many cases, Reporting Services suppresses features that do not work. In other cases, the feature may be available to the user, but does not function correctly. Each browser type handles report features differently. Before you deploy a report, you should always test it in the browser you plan to use.
Note
The report toolbar is part of the HTML Viewer component and it appears at the top of every report that is rendered in a browser window. The report toolbar provides features that let you search the report for information, scroll to a specific page, adjust the page size for viewing purposes, and so on. For more information about the report toolbar or HTML Viewer, see HTML Viewer.
Using Other Browsers and Applications
In some cases, you might be able to use other browsers that are not specifically listed in this topic. The following list provides tips and guidelines for excluding browser-dependent functionality, and provides suggestions for using alternative viewers:
Use a fully qualified report URL that includes parameters for specifying the rendering extension. Specifying an Excel rendering extension, for example, opens the report in the Excel viewer of the browser. Using the Excel rendering extension, or some other rendering extension that is not HTML, lets users use the features of the associated viewer to scroll pages, search the report content, and perform other tasks that would otherwise be performed by using the report toolbar. For more information, see Specifying a Rendering Format in a URL.
Use a fully qualified report URL that includes parameters for suppressing the report toolbar. If you have a simple HTML-based report and you do not need the features in the report toolbar, you can suppress the toolbar so that only the report content is visible to users. For more information about suppressing the toolbar, see Using URL Access Parameters.
Avoid browsers completely by using the file share delivery extension to save the report to the file system. Choose a rendering extension that is not HTML (for example, Excel or PDF). For more information, see File Share Delivery in Reporting Services.
Create a custom application that uses the ReportViewer Web or Windows Forms control. For more information about these controls, see Reporting Services and ReportViewer Controls in Visual Studio.