RDLC reports at MVC project

RDLC reports cannot have connection string and can't directly connected to the database , instead we use the "Object" datasource to provide data to the reports.

The "Object" datasource provides, at the design time , the report by the structure of the data that  will be passed to the report at the runtime

The datasources cannot be added to the MVC project so we need a class library that the datasources will be built upon

Steps

1. create a class library project 
2. add the "ViewModel" class -- that will have the structure of the data 
3. for example

public class PatientViewModel
{
public int Id{get;set;}
public string Name{get;set;}

}

    4. at the solution explorer , select the ViewModelClassLibrary project

    5. at the menu bar => Data => select =>Add New DataSource 

    6. Data Source configuration wizard open => select "Object" Data source =>Next

    7.  select "PatientViewModel " class => finish

    8.create the MVC project 

   9. add new folder called "forms" at the project main folder

  10. add new rdlc report to the folder 

  11 . open the report => at the view menu => press " report data"

12 .create new datasets  => in the list , you will find the created data source at point  (7)

 and give the dataset a specific name => for example => PatientDataSet

13 . at the controller  , create an action for the report

 public ActionResult GetReport()
        {
            LocalReport rep = new LocalReport();
            rep.ReportPath = Server.MapPath("~/Forms/MyReport.rdlc");
            List<PatientViewModel> patients = GetPatients();
            rep.DataSources.Add(new ReportDataSource("PatientDataSet", patients));
 
            //Render the report
            _renderedBytes = rep.Render(
                _reportType,
                _deviceInfo,
                out _mimeType,
                out _encoding,
                out _fileNameExtension,
                out _streams,
                out _warnings);
 
            return File(_renderedBytes, _mimeType);
 
        }