About five years ago I noticed the decline of updates to Performance Point (PPS) in SharePoint, and despite my general dislike of PPS I had this feeling that it was the end of that product. And sure enough, after stringing it along for a few more years, Microsoft finally announced that they were discontinuing support for it.
When it comes to Reporting Services, I have that same feeling as I did with PPS all those years ago. Apart from the HTML5 conversion and integration of Datazen functionality in SSRS 2016, we have not seen much in terms of new functionality and/or a hint of what is to come. And with the popularity of Power BI growing at a rapid pace, are we witnessing the slow decline (and ultimate end) of Reporting Services?
I think we may be, and if you’ve noticed the new subscription option that made its way into the Power BI service a few days ago you will agree that there are but only a few differentiating features left in SSRS: Data-driven subscriptions, parameterized report execution, pixel-perfect control and on-premises hosting.
Most of our customers seem more than happy to forego pixel-perfect control for interactivity and ease of use, and for the most part parameterized report execution can be side-stepped with the intelligent use of report and page filters. This leaves (in my mind at least) only the on-premises hosting option as the main differentiating feature that may prompt customers to opt for SSRS.
I’m not sure about you, but I’ll be sitting on the edge of my proverbial seat to see how this one plays out. Are we going to see a slow convergence of the two products (SSRS & Power BI) until there is no distinguishing features between the two, or are we going to see an on-premises version of Power BI to replace Reporting Services?
Penny for your thoughts?