Quiestions about Report Designer

[Germancho]

I have two questions about the VFP Report Designer:
1. Can I let the end-user to write his own reports using the Report Designer? How do I do that?
2. Can I create a half-page size report using the Report Designer?

 

[mkrausnick]

Question 1: If you are distributing an executable to your users, then the answer is no. The report designer is part of full VFP, so your users would have to buy the full version of VFP. Look into Crystal Reports as a solution for your users to create their own reports.

Question 2: Yes.

Mike Krausnick
Dublin, California

 

[Mike Gagnon]

1. Can I let the end-user to write his own reports using the Report Designer? How do I do that?

I will disagree with Mike's answer and reply that yes you can. The MODIFY REPORT (with nothing else) will create a blank report that can be modified by the user and the command IS distributable. Although a report in FoxPro is more for a super-user (or someone that is familiar with FoxPro).


Mike Gagnon

If you want to get the best response to a question, please check out FAQ184-2483 first.

 

[craigber]

I too must disagree with Mike #1. The report designer IS available at runtime. Also, I disagree about looking at Crystal for end-user reporting. Crystal Reports is more difficult to use than the VFP Report Designer. For runtime reporting look at FoxFire! (

http://www.micromegasystems.com/foxfire/foxfire.htm)

or Stonefield Query (

http://www.stonefieldquery.com/devedition.html)

Craig Berntson
MCSD, Visual FoxPro MVP,

http://www.craigberntson.com

Author, CrysDev: A Developer's Guide to Integrating Crystal Reports"

 

[alvechurchdata]

2. Can I create a half-page size report using the Report Designer?

There's only a restricted choice of page sizes and I only know two ways of getting two records on a single page:

* One is to create a report which holds two records per detail line.

* The other is to resort to the stone age technique of using ? and ?? to write text to the printer.

I'm not proud of either technique and I'd be glad if someone can suggest a better way.

Geoff Franklin

http://www.alvechurchdata.co.uk

 

[Mike Lewis]

I half disagree with Mike #2 and half agree with Craig (or vice versa).

I think the answer depends on your version of VFP. The ability to include MODIFY REPORT in an EXE was introduced relatively recently. Probably in 7.0, or maybe 6.0? Can't remember.

Apart from the fact that the report designer is too techie for most users, there is also an important security issue. Because a report can include any VFP code that the user cares to write, it is a potential conduit for all kinds of mischief.

Mike


Mike Lewis
Edinburgh, Scotland

My Visual Foxpro web site:

http://www.ml-consult.demon.co.uk

My Crystal Reports web site:

http://www.ml-crystal.com

 

[craigber]

Mike,

The ability to do MODIFY REPORT has existed for sometime...certainly prior to VFP 7.0. In fact, I believe that it existed in 2.x.

Craig Berntson
MCSD, Visual FoxPro MVP,

http://www.craigberntson.com

Author, CrysDev: A Developer's Guide to Integrating Crystal Reports"