Eclipse BIRT Report Designer 2.3.2 - SQL Server 2005 Connectivity

Forgive me if this is an obvious question but I can't seem to find a solid answer elsewhere. 
 
I am trying to create a datasource in the open source Eclipse BIRT Report Designer. I am attempting to connect to my MS SQL Server 2005 database server and it seems there is no driver available. I don't see one available anywhere on the birt-exchange site either. I was looking at the report designer features comparison table in .pdf (<a class='bbc_url' href='http://www.birt-exchange.com/download/BIRT-Designers-Comparison-Table.pdf'>http://www.birt-exchange.com/download/BIRT-Designers-Comparison-Table.pdf</a>) and I saw at the bottom of page 2 that there is no SQL Server driver in any of the eclipse products. It appears only the Actuate designers support SQL Server. Is that the case? I can only use Actuate Report Designer to connect to SQL Server? 
 
Thank you for your help.

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cwhiley

Okay well I found the answer to part of my question. 
 
First I had to download the Microsoft SQL Server JDBC Driver 2.0 from MS here. 
<a class='bbc_url' href='http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=99b21b65-e98f-4a61-b811-19912601fdc9&displaylang=en'>Download details: SQL Server JDBC Driver 2.0</a> 
 
Now I've managed to access the driver using the appropriate JDBC .jar file but I'm still unable to connect. Anyone see anything I'm doing wrong on this attached screenshot? When I attempt to connect I get this error... 
 
"com.microsoft.sqlserver.jdbc.SQLServerException: The TCP/IP connection to the host ONE, port 1433 has failed. Error: "Connection refused: connect. Verify the connection properties, check that an instance of SQL Server is running on the host and accepting TCP/IP connections at the port, and that no firewall is blocking TCP connections to the port."." 
 
"GSC_TEST" is my database name 
"ONE" is my computer name 
"ONESQLEXPRESS" is the full host name for the SQL Server 
"1433" is the default port and should be correct 
 
I've tried both integrated authentication as well as the Administrator login and password for Windows. However, my SQL Server Studio manager uses Windows Authentication and works fine. 
 
Any ideas? Any help is appreciated.

cwhiley

I am still unable to connect to my MS SQL Server Express 2005 server with BIRT. I am able to connect with another 3rd party query tool so remote connections are getting in, just not BIRT. Anyone have any suggestions or perhaps a sample connection URL that is running the same database server?

PatrickB

Hello, 
 
There are a couple of things that you can try. First of all, you can use the JTDS driver from <a class='bbc_url' href='http://jtds.sourceforge.net/'>jTDS JDBC Driver</a>. This driver has worked very well for me. Here are the connection properties: 
 
Driver class: net.sourceforge.jtds.jdbc.Driver 
 
Driver URL: jdbc:jtds:sqlserver://<host>:<port>/<database Name> 
 
You also need to ensure that your sql server accepts TCP/IP connections. You can do this by going to SQL Server Configuration Manager, expand SQL Server 2005 Network Configuration, select Protocols for MSSQLSERVER, and enable TCP/IP. 
 
You may also want to ensure that you have port 1433 set as the TCP/IP port. Go to the Registry Editor on the server machine. Go to HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE ? SOFTWARE - Microsoft ? MSSQLServer-MSSQLServer ? SuperSocketNetLib ? TCP. Check the value for TcpPort. I hope this helps.