Hi Shane,
We are in the progress of updating the common infocenter. Here is advance copy of the updated content. Sorry for the loss of formatting.

Configuring the report server: Tasks for Microsoft SQL Server
Set up the Java Runtime Environment, configure Microsoft SQL Server as the Cognos content store, configure the IBM WebSphere Application Server instance to host the report server, build and deploy the enterprise archive (EAR) files, install the EAR files, and create the data warehouses.
The following list gives the steps to configure the report server. If you chose the automatic method for the installation, step 1 is not needed.
1. Create a content store database. Ensure that you, as the current user, have the necessary administrative privileges to create databases and their components. The current user is the one that can connect at run time to the Cognos content store. If you want other users to connect at run time to the Cognos content store, see the IBM Cognos 8 Business Intelligence Installation and Configuration Guide for instructions.
a. If you have an existing content store from a previous installation, delete it.
b. Go to the C:\Program Files\ibm\Rational Insight\reportal\contentstore directory.
c. Run the install.bat batch file.
d. When prompted, specify the parameters for the content store. To see a list of parameters and their explanations, see the related links at the bottom of this page.
2. Create a new content store in Cognos to reference the content database.
a. Launch the Cognos administration console (In Windows, click Start > Programs > Rational Quality Manager Custom Reporting > IBM Cognos 8 > IBM Cognos Configuration).
b. Click Data Access > Content Manager, right-click Content Store, and click New Resource > Database.
c. In the Database name field, enter the name of the database created in step 1.
d. Select the User ID and password row, click the Edit icon, and enter a user name and password that can be used to access the database content store created at step 1.
e. Select Local Configuration, and click Save configuration.
3. Create a new WebSphere Application Server instance to host the report server. This step is not needed if you installed WebSphere Application Server through the Custom Reporting installer.
4. Configure the WebSphere Application Server instance to host the report server.
a. Open the WebSphere Application Server administrative console (open a browser to point to http://localhost:9060/ibm/console/).
b. Replace port 9060 with another port number if it differs from what you recorded from the WebSphere Application Server Profile Management tool.
c. Log on to the WebSphere Application Server administrative console (point the browser to http://localhost:portnumber/ibm/console/login.do, and enter your user name and password. By default, the user name is blank).
d. Expand the Servers node on the left sidebar, and select Application servers.
e. Click the server1 link, and expand the Java and Process Management node.
f. Click the Process Definition link, and click the Java Virtual Machine link.
g. Enter the initial and maximum JVM heap size as 256 and 768.
h. Click Apply (at the bottom of the page), and click the Save link.
i. Click the Environment Entries link.
j. Click New, and add the following property:
LD_LIBRARY_PATH=\cognos\bin
k. Make sure the following property is defined:
PATH=\cognos\bin
l. Click Apply, and click Save.
m. Open the Windows Services control panel and restart the IBM WebSphere Application Server V6.1 Custom Reporting service.
5. Build and deploy the report server EAR file.
a. Launch the Cognos administration console (In Windows, click Start > Programs > Rational Quality Manager Custom Reporting > IBM Cognos 8 > IBM Cognos Configuration).
b. Select Environment, and change all the ports from 9300 to the port number of the WebSphere Application Server profile.
c. Select Portal Services, and change all the ports from 9300 to the port number of the WebSphere Application Server profile.
d. Click Save, and click Close.
e. Select Actions > Build Application Files.
f. Click Next, accept the default values, and click Next.
g. Click Finish, and click Close.
6. Install the report server EAR file.
a. Log on to the WebSphere Application Server administrative console (point the browser to http://localhost:portnumber/ibm/console/login.do, and enter your user name and password).
b. Expand the Applications node on the left sidebar, and select Install New Application.
c. Click Browse, go to the \cognos folder, and select the p2pd.ear file.
d. Accept the default options and click Next. Do this step four times.
e. Click the Save link, click Enterprise Applications in the left sidebar, and if the Default Application is listed, uninstall it.
f. Select the IBM Cognos 8 application, and click Start. The application takes a few minutes to load fully and to start.
g. Open a browser and point it to http://server:port/insight/servlet. If Cognos Content Manager is working correctly, you see something similar to the following text on the Web page:
IBM Cognos 8

Content Manager

Build: 8.4.2519.0

Start time: Tuesday, November 18, 2008 3:00:41 PM PST

Current time: Tuesday, November 18, 2008 3:01:25 PM PST

State: Running.
h. Point the Web browser to http://server:port/insight. You should see the home page of the Custom Reporting portal.
7. Import the Custom Reporting sample reports.
a. Copy the \reportal\deployment\Rational_Example_Reports.zip file to the \cognos\deployment\ directory.
b. Open the Cognos Web application at http://host/cognos8/cgi-bin/cognos.cgi.
c. Open the Cognos administration page (Launch > IBM Cognos Administration).
d. Click Configuration.
e. Click Content Administration, click the New Import icon.
f. Ensure that allrqm is listed as a deployment archive, and click Next.
g. In the Name field, change the name from Rational_Example_Reports to Rational_Reports, and click Next.
h. To import all packages and folders, select the box in the table header, and click Next four times.
i. Click Finish.
j. Click Run.
k. Click OK.
l. Click the Home icon.
m. Verify that all packages and folders are listed in Public Folders.
8. Test the data source connections for the data warehouse and the supported products.
a. Open the Custom Reporting Web application at http://server:port/insight.
Note: If you do not know the URL, see \AppServer\profiles\RationalInsight\logs\AboutThisProfile.txt
b. Open the Cognos administration page (Click IBM Cognos Administration, or if you are at the default home page of Custom Reporting, click the Administration link in the banner).
c. Click Configuration > Data Source Connections > RIDW.
d. Click the Set properties action for the RIDW data source.
e. Click the Connection tab.
f. Click Test the connection.
g. Click Test.
h. Click Close twice, and then click OK.
i. Click Configuration > Data Source Connections > RQM.
Note: To return to the list of data source connections, you might need to click Cognos above the Name field.
j. Click the Set properties action for the product data source; for example, ClearQuest.
k. Click the Connection tab.
l. Click Test the connection.
m. Click Test.
n. Click Close twice, and then click OK.
9. Test-run the Custom Reporting sample reports.
a. Open the Cognos Web application at http://server:port/insight.
b. Click the Rational Quality Manager folder.
c. Run the reports.
10. Create a user for accessing the data source.
a. Open the Cognos administration page (Click IBM Cognos Administration or if you are at the default home page of IBM Cognos, click Launch > Administer IBM Cognos Content).
b. Click Configuration > Data Source Connections > RIDW.
c. Click RIDW.
d. Click New Signon, enter a name, and click Next.
e. Enter the user ID and password to access the data source. To run reports, a user should have at least read privileges to the data source.

We have been trying for a few days now to get RCR installed using MS SQLServer but we have run into problems with both the installation manager and trying to perform the database installation manually.

The instructions I have to say are of little use!

The installation manage fails to display and MS SQL Server instances in the dropdwon list so you can't get past this point in the installation if you try and use the installation manager.

If you follow the instructions to run the run_install_silent.bat you can't because the file doesn't exist. Support finally told us it was called install.bat

But the instructions in http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/rqmhelp/v2r0/index.jsp?topic=/com.ibm.rational.test.qm.reporting.doc/topics/t_prereq_datawarehouse.html request you delete lines from the run_install_silent.bat file, but these linese don't appear in the install.bat file exactly as they appear in the instructions.

Can anybody give us some pointers on the command line parameters that the install.bat file expects to receive or how to run thixs file manually to create the databases for the reporting server and the dataware house. The reporting server database install.bat file is located in the IBM\Rational Insight\reportal\contentstore while the dataware house install.bat appears to be located in \IBM\Rational Insight\datawarehouse\dw.

Any help here would be greatly appreciated

We have stopped trying to install custom reporting manually. We have asked for a IBM Rep to come and install for us.

The instructions are definitely hard to follow. For example, we are installing the report server on machine one, and the MSSQL on machine two (our DBA controlled area).

(1) The instructions tell you to 1st run run_install_silent.bat (install.bat) which you can get from C:\Program Files\IBM\Rational Insight
(2) After you complete this section, then install the report server with the information from the first section.
(3) Configure....blah blah

HOWEVER

You can't get C:\Program Files\IBM\Rational Insight directory needed for step one until you install report server (step 2). Of course, installing the report server (step 2) involves inputting the information from step one...

My DBA/Server team told me to not come back until IBM came to install it in person...

I've gone through these instructions 3 times now and I still can't get this to work following your new instructions

before I get to far just want to verify that where you have specified the environment properties of LD_LIBRARY_PATH=\cognos\bin whether you mean that this value is to be entered as shown or we're supposed to replace with the path to our Rational Insight instation root, which is my case is D:\ibm\RationalInsight. if this is the case then the property should be entered as:

LD_LIBRARY_PATH=D:\ibm\RationalInsight\cognos\bin

Can you confirm which value is correct for the LD_LIBRARY_PATH and the PATH environment variables, or the full path to the installation directory, i.e. D:\inm,\RationalInsight?

When replacing port 9300 in the IBm Cognos Configuration with the port of the Websphere application server, in this case 9080, as specified in the instructions it results in Cognos being unable to start.

This happens even if I create a new Websphere instance on port 9081, replcaing 9300 with 9081 results in the same error. Why am I telling cognos to use the same port as websphere when it's obvious that two services trying to use the same port won't work! I'm cedrtainly not changing the server.xml file in the tomcat config directory to set these values so something is changing them!

When you exit the IBM Cognos Configuration tool, it asks to start the services and you say "OK", you get an error reported on the dialog that appears which details the tasks the IBM Cognos Configuration is performing. It fails on the Starting Service "IBM Cognos 8:9080".

The error reported is:

[ ERROR ] CFG-ERR-0106 IBM Cognos Configuration did not receive a response from the IBM Cognos 8 service in the time allotted.

Check that IBM Cognos 8 service is available and properly configured.

so the questions are:

1. So why is it trying to start a server on portt 9080 when Websphere is using this port already?
2. Why did I replace port 9300 with port 9080 if it causes a conflict with webspere? what was the point of this as I could have left it as 9300
3. What is tomcat being used for and why is it trying to use port 9080 which is already in use by websphere?

while the instructions are better then they were, this still doesn't work so what am I missing here. I've been spending months intermittently trying to get t his to install. The auotmatic installation procedure doesn't work and not the manual one doesn't either.

By the way the URL's are wrong as if you accept the defaults when building the ear the URL root context is p2pd not insight

looking at the IBM Cognos Configration tool setting values under environment, to create the context root of insight instead of p2pd, you woiuld have to change the values in the IBM Cognos Configruation tool that read similar to the following:

http://localhost:9080/p2pd/servlet/dispatch/ext

to

http://localhost:9080/insight/servlet/dispatch/ext

then rebuild the application and change the context root in the rebuild applicatrion dialog to be insight! Is this a correct assumption?

So does anyone now enough about manually installing RQM CR to be able to assist. I have a support case raised with IBm Rational Support but it's disappeared into the ether.

Surely someone has performed a manual install successfully who can give me an idea of what I'm missing!

Thanks in advance

I also could not get this working using the instructions provided here or in the help, but I'm coming to the conclusion that it's actually not necessary to rebuild the application in WebSphere. I read elsewhere that configuration changes do not necessitate a WAS rebuild. Also I observed the following:

Having installed RCR, stopped the HTTP server and started the WAS service, I get "not running" in the Insight Server.

I deleted the Content Store, created a new one that tested successfully, saved it and restarted the Cognos server. Then I restarted the WAS server, and I get "running" in the Insight Server.

The only odd thing is that Insight does not say "Rational Custom Reporting" on the banner, as I think it should. In fact it doesn't say anything except "IBM Cognos Connection".

Perhaps someone more knowledgeable than me can verify whether it is in fact necessary to rebuild the ear if the only thing you are doing is creating a new Content Store?