BLOGS BY TOPIC▼
BLOGS BY AUTHOR▼
BLOGS BY YEAR▼
You can import data into tabular models from virtually any data source, as shown by this tutorial.
- Importing data from other data sources
- Importing data from Excel, Access, CSV files or the clipboard
- Importing data from SSRS (Reporting Services) (this blog)
- Importing from Analysis Services cubes/tabular models
- Importing from other data sources
This blog is part of our online SSAS Tabular tutorial; we also offer lots of other Analysis Services training resources.
Posted by Andy Brown on 04 January 2016
You need a minimum screen resolution of about 700 pixels width to see our blogs. This is because they contain diagrams and tables which would not be viewable easily on a mobile phone or small laptop. Please use a larger tablet, notebook or desktop computer, or change your screen resolution settings.
Importing data from SSRS (Reporting Services)
I must admit I can't see why you'd ever want to do this, but for the sake of completeness (and in case - as is likely - I'm missing the point), here's how to import data from a tablix item in an SSRS report.
A tablix item means a table, list or matrix. This blog assumes that you're comfortable with creating reports in SSRS.
The first thing to do is to create a report:

My modest report, listing the animals in the MAM database.
Now deploy your report:

You'll need to enter your target server URL as usual before deploying.
Your report should show up in Report Manager:

You can see I've done a bit more furtive editing before I deployed ...
You can then choose to import data into your model:

Double-click on your model to edit it, then choose this menu option.
Choose Report (it's near the bottom):

Scroll down to find this option.
If you can't see the report you're looking for, type your report server URL in the Name box:

Here I've deployed my report to this URL.
Find and double-click on the report whose data you want to import:

I might have renamed this report before deploying it too!
SSAS Tabular shows what your report looks like:

I might have sneakily snuck a matrix into the report too before deploying it ...
As ever, specify who you want to impersonate:

I'm going to be myself ...
You can now specify which tablix items on the report you want to import data from:

I'm importing my animal table and my weird matrix at the bottom of the report.
The good news is that an imported table looks sensible:

Although it would have been quicker to get the data from the underlying SQL Server database ...
My weird matrix data, on the other hand, looks ... weird:

Importing data from a matrix.
And that completes my look at importing data from SSRS reports. Time to look now at SSRS's sibling - Analysis Services - and show how to import data from either a cube or a tabular model.
- Importing data from other data sources
- Importing data from Excel, Access, CSV files or the clipboard
- Importing data from SSRS (Reporting Services) (this blog)
- Importing from Analysis Services cubes/tabular models
- Importing from other data sources