Forcing Null Records To Print?

[Mark Richards]

Hi.

I am basically a novice with access. Sorry for the long question, but I
can't find a short way to make this clear....

I have a database I created to track service calls for a client with a few
dozen buildings across the state. They require a monthly report sorted by
location showing all the activity for a given month (**even if there was no
activity for a given location**). I have a basic DB structure I copied from
the access sample "service call management" altered to suit. I built a
report with the info grouped by location (building name, address, Etc) ,
then call number (call number, date, work provided, Etc) and finally, I have
the parts and labor in listed in the detail section. I filter the report
by date range when run.

This all works slick for the locations with a workorder, but I need to find
a way for every location to print even if there is no activity (ie; nothing
in the detail section) for that location. My workaround now is that at the
end of the month I create a dummy workorder for each location without
activity and select a dummy inventory part named "noservice". I have some
code in the report to un-hide a label stating "no activity this period" if
the part ID = "noservice" (as well as setting the instance of the dummy part
to hidden). It works, but I need to enter about 25 dummy workorders a month
:-(

I figure it must be some code logic like "for each record in group 1 where
the detail section is null then display text stating no activity at that
location" but I can't figure it out.

Any Ideas?

TIA and sorry for the book.
--
Mark Richards
ro********@hotmail.com

[David Schofield]

On Wed, 5 Jan 2005 18:03:04 -0500, "Mark Richards"
<<delete_this_part>ro********@hotmail.com> wrote:

Hi.

I am basically a novice with access. Sorry for the long question, but I
can't find a short way to make this clear....

I have a database I created to track service calls for a client with a few
dozen buildings across the state. They require a monthly report sorted by
location showing all the activity for a given month (**even if there was no
activity for a given location**). I have a basic DB structure I copied from
the access sample "service call management" altered to suit. I built a
report with the info grouped by location (building name, address, Etc) ,
then call number (call number, date, work provided, Etc) and finally, I have
the parts and labor in listed in the detail section. I filter the report
by date range when run.

This all works slick for the locations with a workorder, but I need to find
a way for every location to print even if there is no activity (ie; nothing
in the detail section) for that location. My workaround now is that at the
end of the month I create a dummy workorder for each location without
activity and select a dummy inventory part named "noservice". I have some
code in the report to un-hide a label stating "no activity this period" if
the part ID = "noservice" (as well as setting the instance of the dummy part
to hidden). It works, but I need to enter about 25 dummy workorders a month
:-(

I figure it must be some code logic like "for each record in group 1 where
the detail section is null then display text stating no activity at that
location" but I can't figure it out.

Any Ideas?

TIA and sorry for the book.
--
Mark Richards
ro********@hotmail.com

Hi
You could add a group footer giving the total number of items in each
group, or containing a control set to a special remark if there are no
items and nothing otherwise (use an iif statement) Then it would be
obvious which groups have no entries. It would only make the total
report significantly longer if most of the groups have very few
entries.

If you were clever you could probably make this footer only appear if
the group was empty (by using a control of zero height with "can grow"
property set to true, or by fiddling with the visibility in the
format event perhaps)
David