Do I still need a Pro/Premium license if I have a Report Server subscription?

[Anonymous]

I'd like to share my dashboards with internal members of the department but was told by my organization head that sharing permissions can't be granted to me because this isn't a feature. They also mentioned they only support SQL connections, but I'm not sure if they have a SQL Enterprise license as part of the report server subscription. From what I've seen, it looks like dashboards are being shared internally (members log in via their company credentials to view the dashboards). 

If I have the report server subscription, do I still need a pro/premium license to share dashboards? 

[Anonymous]

@lbendlin Are you able to share the dashboard with members outside the organization if you went with the SQL enterprise license? My head insists we don't have sharing capabilities even though everyone in the organization can see the published dashboards (unsure about people outside). They've requested I send them the dashboard and data for them to upload, so I'm confused on why they can't give me publishing access if this feature exists (how are they uploading if there are no sharing/publishing capabilities?)

[Icey · Accepted solution]

Hi @Anonymous ,

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Are you able to share the dashboard with members outside the organization if you went with the SQL enterprise license? 

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In this scenario, to enable external users access, you can configure Custom Authentication or use ADFS as proxy.

Best Regards,

Icey

If this post helps, then please consider Accept it as the solution to help the other members find it more quickly.

[Anonymous]

@lbendlin I understood it as if an organization has premium then external users (outside the org) would NOT need a pro license. 

[Icey]

Hi @Anonymous ,

So what are you using to share reports to external users? Power BI Service or Power BI Report Server? 

In addition, for allow users from other domains to access PBIRS, you may refer to this:

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In Reporting Services, if we want to access Reporting Services from other domain, we should apply domain trust or do extranet deployment. It will be considered as “same” domain to SSRS so that users from a trusted domain can access Reporting Services. And when the outer domain user access the current domain, they need to provide the credential.

Here is an official documentation about Extranet or Internet Deployment.

Follow the steps and then we could successfully put Reporting Services on an Internet-facing Web server to distribute general information to the public at large or private corporate data to authorized and authenticated users.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/sql/sql-server-2008-r2/ms159272(v=sql.105)

Set different domain as trust domain and then grant the external user permission.
https://www.oreilly.com/library/view/active-directory-cookbook/0596004648/ch02s18.html
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/previous-versions/windows/it-pro/windows-server-2003/cc775736(v=ws.10)?redirectedfrom=MSDN

Reporting Services provides an extensible architecture that allows you to plug in custom or forms-based authentication modules. The most common scenario for using custom authentication is to support Internet or extranet access to a Web application.

For more information, please refer to the article below:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/reporting-services/security/configure-custom-or-forms-authentication-on-the-report-server?redirectedfrom=MSDN&view=sql-server-ver15

Reference: How to share external user my SSRS reports(My data source is Azure DB) - Microsoft Q&A

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Best Regards,

Icey

If this post helps, then please consider Accept it as the solution to help the other members find it more quickly.

[Icey]

Hi @Anonymous ,

Any feedback?🤔

Best Regards,

Icey

[lbendlin]

If you are on Premium then internal users (users within your AD)  do not need a Pro license if you share the apps.  Users outside of your AD do need a Pro license if you share content with them.

[lbendlin]

My (limited) understanding of external sharing is that you have to do a Premium Capacity and the external users have to have Pro licenses.

[lbendlin]

I think there are two ways to get a Report Server license - either you have a SQL enterprise license, or a Power BI premium capacity.  Both come with complementary report server.

Not sure what your organization head is alluding to - maybe they were thinking Premium capacity?