title: NullReferenceException when rendering rdlc as PDF in ASP.Net website
body: <p>First off, the error doesn't occur when running locally, only when I have it published to the web server (Server 2008 R2).  The error message (first portion) that gets returned is:</p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <p>MICROSOFT.REPORTING.WEBFORMS.LOCALPROCESSINGEXCEPTION: AN ERROR OCCURRED DURING LOCAL REPORT PROCESSING. ---> SYSTEM.NULLREFERENCEEXCEPTION: OBJECT REFERENCE NOT SET TO AN INSTANCE OF AN OBJECT.
       A
    MICROSOFT.REPORTINGSERVICES.RENDERING.HPBPROCESSING.TABLIX.UPDATETOPITEMKT(PAGEITEM TOPITEM, ROWINFO ROWINFO, PAGEDETAILCELL CURRCELL)</p>
  </blockquote>
  
  <p>The code snippet that is rendering the report is in VB.Net...</p>
  
  <pre><code>Dim report As LocalReport = New LocalReport()
  report.DataSources.Clear()
  report.ReportPath = "App_GlobalResources\MyReport.rdlc"
  report.DataSources.Add(New ReportDataSource("MyDataSource", MyDataTable))
  report.Refresh()
  Dim byteReport As Byte() = New Byte() {}
  'The next line is where it fails with the exception above.
  byteReport = report.Render("pdf")  'Get bytes to use with memory stream
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>We do have other reports that work fine using the same code, but this report uses the Row Groups in the table to group data together with a heading...the ones that work do not use the row groups.</p>
  
  <p>Again, this only happens when posted to the web server.  I have found a couple links that seem to be similar (one below), but wanted to see if anyone had experienced this.
  <a href="https://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/66c841e5-61b8-4fc5-9b7f-0df3a2ed5897/reportviewer-export-to-pdf-null-reference?forum=vsreportcontrols" rel="nofollow">ReportViewer export to PDF Null reference</a></p>