What is the General section in PBRS Options?

In PBRS, you have the option to configure many different aspects of how the software performs. You can access these configuration options by clicking the Options button at the top of PBRS. The first tab is labeled "General".

Options - General

  • Go to Options.
Options PBRS Home Screen
  • Select General.
Power BI and SSRS. General section in Options in PBRS.

In PBRS, you have the option to configure many different aspects of how the software performs. You can access the configuration options by clicking the Options button at the top of PBRS. This will bring up an Options window. The first tab, the General tab, is broken down into four sections: User Experience, Error Handling, Misc. & Reports. Below, we will take a closer look at each of these sections.

User Experience

  • Customer #: The value that should be listed here is your individual customer number, which is provided by ChristianSteven when you purchase PBRS. It identifies you in our billing and tech support system and allows you to log support tickets through PBRS itself. Once you receive your customer number from ChristianSteven, you should input it here (if it is not already listed).

If you are using the free trial version of PBRS, no value will be listed here and this field will be left blank until you purchase PBRS. If you are experiencing issues with PBRS during your free trial, contact your Sales Manager. You will be unable to log a support ticket through PBRS.

  • Automatically Refresh Desktop: When viewing the PBRS desktop (especially when using Detail option), this option will refresh the screen at the interval of seconds you specify. This will allow you to see an up to date status of your schedules at a glance without having to refresh the system manually.
  • Only convert remote paths to UNC: This setting instructs PBRS only to convert remote paths to UNC. This option helps prevent any path resolution problems you may otherwise have. Local paths are not affected if you are a system administrator. (network or shared paths)
  • Use Relative time: This setting lets you select whether timings should be displayed and saved in the time zone of the scheduler or the time zone of the user(if they are different).

Error Handling

The Error Handling section tells PBRS what to do when PBRS encounters a problem. You can choose between the following options:

  • Send an Email: Choose to be notified by email if a report fails to run successfully. You can specify any email address in this field as long as it is valid.
  • Send an SMS: Choose to receive an SMS text message on your cellphone if a report fails to run successfully. This can be any phone number as long as it is valid.
  • Close Oops Messages after X Seconds: Automatically close any error messages after a specified amount of time.

An error log file is stored in the installation folder (typically, Program Files\Christiansteven\PBRS). You can also view the log file from the System Monitor.

Misc

  • Sync User Defaults across all clients: If you have multiple installations of PBRS and all of them are connected to the same database, you can select this checkbox to sync the User Defaults on this installation of PBRS with the other installations.
  • Automatically check for updates: Checking this option will ensure that PBRS automatically checks for and alerts you when an update is available. If you do not have this option checked in PBRS, you will need to manually check for updates to PBRS by following our Product Info & Updates blog.
  • Load SSRS cascading parameters automatically: If you are using Microsoft SQL Server Reporting Services, click on this option to display cascading parameters.
  • Update Power BI embed URL every (Days): Check this option to automatically update Power BI Reports embed URL.
  • Enable daily automated system backups: Check this option to enable daily automated system backups.
  • Enable detail view paging in-app window: Check this option to view PBRS reports by pages.

Reports

  • Show hidden report parameters (SSRS): Click on this option to display any hidden parameters contained in SSRS reports.
  • Enable system verbose logging: Verbose logging allows PBRS to record more details regarding schedules, outputs, files, errors, etc. It is especially helpful should PBRS experience issues where technical support or Development would need to troubleshoot. Having this enabled does not impact user functionality in any way. Unless otherwise advised, please leave this option checked.
  • Use "ReportExecution" Endpoint for Report Execution: When scheduling reports for SSRS, it will tell PBRS to use a different API endpoint for rendering the reports.
  • Suppress error message when a report is blank: Click on this option to stop displaying the Report is blank message every time you execute a report manually that contains a blank report. 
  • Skip SSRS Parameters where the value is an empty string: Check this option to skip SSRS parameters when the value is an empty string.
  • Set schedule's next run before it runs: Check this option to set the schedule's next run before it runs by the scheduler.