SSRS Superscript Comma, Numbers and Letters

The term superscript or subscript is used to call a symbol, a number, a figure, or an indicator that is smaller compared to the normal like of type and is set slightly above it (superscript) or below it (subscript). If you are planning to add trademark, copyright, or the other symbol to your presentation, you may want for it to appear slightly above the rest of the text. For those who are making a footnote, you may also want to include a number.

One day, you may find you have to display numbers in superscript or subscript format in a SSRS report. For example, if you recently ran into a report that required footnotes describing the contents of columns. If you have to display the chemical or mathematical formulas you may also think that the number subscripting and superscripting is important.

Unluckily, if you dig into font properties available in SSRS you will not be able to find these options available. Fortunately, there is another way available. This one will allow you to show numbers in the superscript or subscript styles in a SSRS report. A thing called Unicode font has special characters that display as superscripted and subscripted versions of the common number characters. This following table will list the integer code points that represent the superscript and subscript versions of the number characters. You will be able to show these characters directly or by using the character codes in an expression in SSRS.

First of all, you will need to choose a Unicode font to use for your header text that includes the special superscript and subscript characters. Lucida Sans Unicode is the most recommended one. If you want to include these characters, you can just copy and paste them where you need them as plain text. You should not have any problems seeing your superscripts and subscripts both while you are designing your SSRS report and when you have spread it if you have selected a compatible one.

For example, you want to use CO₂ Levels. All that you have to do is to try copying and pasting the example text directly into the column header in your report that you have already set up with a great Unicode font. Do you see the subscripted 2 appears just as should? Now, it is time for you to try directly copying a superscript character from the table above and using it instead.

The alternative option for making these superscript and subscript characters displayed is to use the Visual Basic ChrW() function in an expression. This function will display the characters based on the Unicode point integer you give it. For instance, you could make this placeholder expression for CO₂ Levels by using the Sub. Code for 2 from the table above:

=”CO” & ChrW(8322) & “Levels”  

If you are using a font in your SSRS report that does not support these superscript and subscript characters, for example your report uses Times New Roman and you want to keep using that one, you can leave everything set up as it is in Times New Rowman and where you have to use the special character make a separate placeholder expression just for it. In this case, here is the possibility that your example may look:

CO<<expr>> Levels

Then, in the properties of the placeholder, make sure to choose the right Unicode font that includes the superscript and subscript characters. In your placeholder, the next thing that you need to do is to paste the right character that you need or set up an expression like this:

=”” & ChrW (8322)

There are a lot of Unicode characters that you may want to use in your SSRS reports aside from the number set listed in the table above. The other characters are available to be found in the Windows Character Map application or from the official website of Unicode Map. All the sources include the hexadecimal code point for the characters as well. If you want to use that info in the ChrW() function, you will need to convert the hexadecimal number to a binary number, which is able to be done online with a tool such as Math is Fun converter.

Here are some other Unicode characters that you may want to include in the reports:

⁰ ¹ ² ³ ⁴ ⁵ ⁶ ⁷ ⁸ ⁹ ⁺ ⁻ ⁼ ⁽ ⁾

₀ ₁ ₂ ₃ ₄ ₅ ₆ ₇ ₈ ₉ ₊ ₋ ₌ ₍ ₎

ᵃ ᵇ ᶜ ᵈ ᵉ ᶠ ᵍ ʰ ⁱ ʲ ᵏ ˡ ᵐ ⁿ ᵒ ᵖ ʳ ˢ ᵗ ᵘ ᵛ ʷ ˣ ʸ ᶻ

ᴬ ᴮ ᴰ ᴱ ᴳ ᴴ ᴵ ᴶ ᴷ ᴸ ᴹ ᴺ ᴼ ᴾ ᴿ ᵀ ᵁ ᵂ

ₐ ₑ ᵢ ₒ ᵣ ᵤ ᵥ ₓ

½ ¼ ¾ ⅓ ⅔ ⅕ ⅖ ⅗ ⅘ ⅙ ⅚ ⅛ ⅜ ⅝ ⅞ № ℠ ™ ©

SSRS or SQL Server Reporting Services is the name of the reporting software that allows people to make formatted reports with tables in the form of images, data, graphs, and charts. All the reports are hosted on a server that is able to be executed any time using parameters defined by the users. This one is part of the Microsoft SQL Server Services suite.

The features of SSRS include allowing you to make ad hoc reports and saving them to the server, offering Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) application and pluggable architecture, retrieving data from managed, OLE ODBC, and DB connections, storing and managing custom reports, creating custom controls by using report-processing extension, embedding graphics and images to the reports, and so on.

There are three kinds of SSRS reporting services. The first one is Microsoft SQL Server Integration services which integrate data from different sources. The second one is Microsoft SQL Server Analytical service which helps for the analysis of the data. The third one is Microsoft SQL Server Reporting service that allows for generating a visual report of the data.

Related Posts