Rownumber() unsopported in reports?

Question

I have the following query (This is returned by tablevalued function)

SELECT 
ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY ClientHId)  AS RowNumber,
ClientHId,
FirstName,
LastName,
FROM Client

Then I populate my dataset in SSRS like this:

select RowNumber,ClientHId,FirstName,LastName from fuctionClient

So far so good. Now, I am trying to use RowNumber column for sorting or displaying. If I try to sort, SSRS errors out says: "unsopported datatype exception" if I just try to show it in tablix it displays #error instead of rownumber. Visual Studio intellisense says that only integer, string, char... are supported. but Row_Number function returns integer! I was even trying to do cast as integer on rownumber but still does not help. Have anyone experienced the same problem? ClinetHid - HierarchyId

Answer 1

The dreaded "Could not reproduce."

I just created a sample report with a query almost identical to yours, including creating a table-valued UDF and then calling that from the report. I then ordered the detail group by the RowNumber field without any problems. I made sure that I called the RowNumber field by the same name that you show above.

How do you declare the return datatype for that field in the UDF?

CREATE FUNCTION [dbo].[JamieTestFunction]
(
)
RETURNS 
@Requests TABLE 
(
    -- Make sure your type below is correct:
    [RowNumber] int, 
    [ClientID] int,
    [ClientName] NVARCHAR(200)
)
AS
BEGIN
INSERT @Requests
SELECT 
    ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY ClientID)  AS RowNumber,
    ClientID,
    ClientName
    FROM clients

    RETURN;
END

(Also, make sure that wherever you are specifying the RowNumber to use the Field!RowNumber.Value, not the built in RowNumber() function in SSRS, which may give different results. I doubt this is your problem though.)