Reference Book Needed

I'm a consultant with 20+ years of experience. With Crystal Report Writer,
I just sat down and starting playing with it to figure it out, but now I am
confronted with using SQL Reporting Services 2005.
It is definitely giving me a shot of humility because I am finding it the
most frustrating experience ever. I purchased a pretty good book written by
Brian Larson, but it is presented in a procedural format, and is not being
very helpful when I have something specific to accomplish. I'm also trying
to use the online help and newsgroups, but the process is painstakingly
slow.
My challenge of the moment is in constructing a date range expression, but I
am also stuck on the parameters of the format function. I loved Crystal in
that I could use the wizard to give me a jump start with the formatting, and
then could edit it into more advanced queries.
Can anyone offer any suggestions on where I could find a good SQL Reporting
Services reference? I'm open to anything at this point -- website, book,
notes scribbled on a napkin...I know what you mean about books with references instead of walking through
the procedures. I bought Hitchhiker's Guide to SQL Server 2000 Reporting
Services by Peter Blackburn, William R. Vaughn , because I've read some good
reviews about it, and I liked the title and SQL Server 2000 Reporting
Services Step by Step Book/cd Package by S Misner because it came cheap with
the other one. I think I bought them too late, as they focus on how to do
the things I already knew how to do, and the references are poor. But when I
go through them, I can find things that I didn't know. Out of the two, only
one has been updated, "SQL Server 2005 Reporting Services Step by Step" by
S. Misner.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Server-2005-Reporting-Services-Step/dp/0735622507/sr=1-1/qid=1160306842/ref=sr_1_1/026-7617136-7864435?ie=UTF8&s=books
You might want to check any reviews for it first, as it seems to be a
beginner's book.
My main source of information about Reporting Services has been articles
written by William E. Pearson, III
http://www.databasejournal.com/article.php/1459531
I started reading his articles when I started working with RS in 2004, and
got most of the basics from him. The first tutorials are based on SQL Server
2000 and RS 2000, but the later ones are based on RS 2005. Most of what he
writes about the 2000 edition still holds for 2005, though, so they're not
entirely useless.
I also find Brian Welcker's blog "Direct Reports" usefull
http://blogs.msdn.com/bwelcker/default.aspx
And from his blog you find links to other good RS blogs like Tudor's weblog
(http://blogs.msdn.com/bwelcker/default.aspx) and Chris Hay's Sleazy Hacks
(very usefull, http://blogs.msdn.com/ChrisHays/)
But whenever I need help to find out how to do something, I use the RS news
group. I know there's a forum for it as well, but it wasn't very active when
I started working with RS, and it's hard to teach old dogs new tricks. A lot
of answers can be found in old ng posts, and if you can't find it, ask and
you might get an answer. It's slow, I know, but when you figure out the
basics and the differences from Crystal Reports, it gets better.
Kaisa M. Lindahl Lervik
"Cindy Mikeworth" <CindyMikeworth@.newsgroups.nospam> wrote in message
news:uXbqlNk6GHA.4496@.TK2MSFTNGP05.phx.gbl...
> I'm a consultant with 20+ years of experience. With Crystal Report
> Writer, I just sat down and starting playing with it to figure it out, but
> now I am confronted with using SQL Reporting Services 2005.
> It is definitely giving me a shot of humility because I am finding it the
> most frustrating experience ever. I purchased a pretty good book written
> by Brian Larson, but it is presented in a procedural format, and is not
> being very helpful when I have something specific to accomplish. I'm also
> trying to use the online help and newsgroups, but the process is
> painstakingly slow.
> My challenge of the moment is in constructing a date range expression, but
> I am also stuck on the parameters of the format function. I loved Crystal
> in that I could use the wizard to give me a jump start with the
> formatting, and then could edit it into more advanced queries.
> Can anyone offer any suggestions on where I could find a good SQL
> Reporting Services reference? I'm open to anything at this point --
> website, book, notes scribbled on a napkin...
>