SSRS – Alternate Row Colors of A Group

This has always been a challenge in Reporting Services – you’ve tried using this standard alternate row shading for a group but the alternation doesn’t work as expected:

=IIF(RowNumber(Nothing) Mod 2, "WhiteSmoke", "White")

For a Tablix Group, do the following:

• Click Report >> Report Properties (or right click outside the bounds of your report within Design view and select Report Properties)
• Click the Code tab and enter this custom function:

Public _evenRow As Boolean
Public Function EvenRow() As Boolean
_evenRow = Not _evenRow
return _evenRow
End Function

• Right click your Tablix Row Group and select Row Group >> Group Properties.
• Click the Variables tab and Add a new group variable.
  • Name: EvenRow
  • Value: =Code.EvenRow()
• Now, instead of using the standard IIF(RowNumber… expression for the background color, use this expression for the background color of the row:

=IIF(Variables!EvenRow.Value=TRUE,"WhiteSmoke","White")

As far as I know, the moment you sort your group by an aggregate [Count(id)] the method fails. Otherwise, works great!

I am still trying to figure out how to get around this.