How to build nice repport with Revolution

[Jan Schenkel]

--- Philippe de Martelaere <p2m at netkiri.com> wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> I'm a new user of Revolution and it's a real
> pleasure to work with this 
> soft.
> I was also an old user of Hypercard since version
> 1.0 to the last one.
> 
> Revolution is nice, but I don't find à easy way to
> create nice repport.
> 
> Of course, for printing a text or a list I use
> revPrintField, but I 
> want to create
> some repports more complex.
> 
> Just for an exemple, if I want to print address
> labels using a MySQL
> database and let the user choose his personnal size
> of labels.
> How can I do that ?
> 
> I think that the repport builder doesn't more exist.
> I remember the
> create repport from Hypercard, it was so nice and
> easy.
> 
> My software will be used by different countries, so
> I have to
> let the choice of the paper size US Letter and A4
> for exemple.
> How I do that with Revolution ?
> 
> Thank you for your help
> 
> Philippe
> 

Hi Philippe,

Welcome to the Revolution -- it won't be televized,
but at least we'll have fun while we're at it ;-)

As it is, you have three options for reporting :

1) using an external application to handle the
formatting

2) using a template stack that you fill up with the
rel data and then print

3) waiting a few more weeks for Quartam Reports to
make its way out of project into product stage

Allow me to elaborate on these options.

====

1) External applications

Wide-spread applications such as Word (or Apple's
brand new Pages) allow you to make .RTF files, which
are nothing but text files describing the formatting,
including tables, headers and footers.

When you create the files in the external application,
fill them with data 'tags' which you can then replace
in a Revolution script :
--
replace "<<Name_1>>" with tName in tRTFtext
--

When you're done replacing the data, you write the RTF
data to a text file, and open it in the external
applcation to print it.

Advantage : can be done fairly quickly, especially
with Word which comes with a slew of predefined label
sizes

Downside : requires that your end user has a
compatible application when it comes to viewing and
printing

2) Template stacks

You create a stack that is large enough for a single
page that you want to print. You place enough fields
on it and lay them out so that they match your labels.

Then your printing script fills the fields with the
data that you want to print :
--
put tName into field "Name_1" of stack
"LabelsTemplate"
--

Once the fields are filled with data, you just use the
'print card' command. If you want to print data that
fills more than one page in a single job, look at the
'open printing' and 'close printing' commands.

Advantage : no external applications or library needed

Downside : tedious to lay-out and script reports

3) Quartam Reports

Now as the person working on that project, I'm not
very impartial *grin* -- and it may not be the best
solution for your particular situation.

Nevertheless, I invite you to read more about it :
<http://www.quartam.com/reports/>

Advantage : aimed at full-blown report printing, it
also offers support for labels

Downside : isn't available yet.

====

Finally, allow me to point out that there's no need to
post your question three times through different email
addresses. If someone feels up to replying, you will
get your reply ; multiplicity does not speed up the
thinking process in this very capable volunteer group,
I've noticed ;-)

Hope this helped,

Jan Schenkel.

=====
Quartam - Tools for Revolution
<http://www.quartam.com>

=====
"As we grow older, we grow both wiser and more foolish at the same time."  (La Rochefoucauld)


		
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