Publishing Excel Spreadsheets on SSRS - Security Issue

Publishing a cube connected Excel Spreadsheet is a great way to distribute cube access to users. If you delivery mechanism is SSRS, you might notice that your permissions seem wonky.

We recently had this issue and I wanted to share the resolution:

Excel Spreadsheet links through SSRS are "Resources" not "Reports." Check your SSRS Security Roles to make sure that the users you intend to expose these spreadsheets to have the "View Resources" task checked (along with "View Reports").

More explicitly - for newer admins.

1) Navigate to the web interface for your SSRS server
2) Click "Site Settings" in upper right corner
3) Under the Security heading, click "Configure item-level role definitions"
4) Select "Browser"
4) Check "View Resources" (set value to 'True' by checking the box)
5) Click Ok to save and exit.

If you use SQL Server Mgmt Studio to manage SSRS:
1) Connect to your server using the Reporting Services connection type
2) Open the Security directory
3) Open the Roles directory
2) Right-click on your genearal user Role - usually "Browser" - and select "Properties"
3) Check the permission called "View Resources"
4) Save.