Curious about Access 12 Report Formatting

[Dave]

I was curious in regards to Access 12; specifically more fluent report
formatting.

I'm an average user, but from my end, I find more and more need for
cleaner reports....and do not always want to merge with Word. Although
I believe my reports are very clean and well laid out, they always tend
to look more like an office form, with underlined spaces that require
to be filled in.

As an Example, I just built a report for Wills, and a lot of text
fields need to be placed into the report within a lot of standard text.
Most of the text boxes need to be underlined and bold, this presents
the form look, I don't want. As I do not know how big a persons name
will be, I have to ensure I leave enough space to accommodate for
this...which not always gives the clean consecutive feel to the
paragraph(s), and sentence structures formatting which could be
achieved in Word, i.e.

I _____Billy Bob Bloggins______________________, declare this.....
vice

I Billy Bob Bloggins, declare this.....

Additionally, I can live without word wrap (would be nice, but I
appreciate the difficulties in this), but the need for Full
Justification is always an issue. I know there are ways to achieve
this (Steven Lebans), but is would be nice to have this incorporated
directly in Access.

Anyway, I was just wondering if some of these issues have been
considered in the new Access version.

Cheers,

Dave

[Bernard Peek]

In message <11**********************@z14g2000cwz.googlegroups .com>, Dave
<da**********@gmail.com> writes

I _____Billy Bob Bloggins______________________, declare this.....
vice

I Billy Bob Bloggins, declare this.....

You can do that by defining text variables to hold boilerplate text then
concatenating the variables in the report. I think that will do what you
want, and it will work in current versions of Access.

If you decide to try this take a look at the difference in the way the
"&" and "+" operators work for concatenation. The difference can be
quite useful at times.
--
Bernard Peek
London, UK. DBA, Manager, Trainer & Author.

[Dave]

Concatenating like this: ClientNames: ([GivenName] & " "+[Surname])

But I'm still not sure how to apply this to make my report format
flow better, when I cannot guarantee the size of a persons name; some
names could be 10 characters, while others could be 30...

How could I make the paragraph flow, without large spaces to
accommodate variable name sizes? How will the paragraph stretch using
just the above?

Is there an example I could review?

Cheers,

Dave

[Bernard Peek]

In message <11**********************@g49g2000cwa.googlegroups .com>, Dave
<da**********@gmail.com> writes

Concatenating like this: ClientNames: ([GivenName] & " "+[Surname])
Yup!
But I'm still not sure how to apply this to make my report format
flow better, when I cannot guarantee the size of a persons name; some
names could be 10 characters, while others could be 30...
Concatenation tricks help if, for instance, you want to include a middle
initial if there is one. If you concatenate the name, one space each
side of the name and the boilerplate text you don't have any extra
spaces in the paragraph. You end up with just one text box the full
width of the page with all of the text of the paragraph in it.

How could I make the paragraph flow, without large spaces to
accommodate variable name sizes? How will the paragraph stretch using
just the above?

Is there an example I could review?

None of my work is online.

--
Bernard Peek
London, UK. DBA, Manager, Trainer & Author.

[Dave]

Sorry, I'm still unsure of how to apply your suggestion correctly.

Do I add all the text for a paragraph within the one text field?? i.e.:

([GivenName] & " "+[MInitial]& " "+[Surname])

Would look like this:
|
I, ([GivenName] & " "+[MInitial]& " "+[Surname]), agree to be bound by
the provisions of this Agreement and agree to determine by this
Agreement, in the event we cohabit and later.....blah, blah, blah. And
we contiune here.....

How do I add the other text to the para...if you could further clarify,
that would be most helpful.

Your patience's is appreciated!

[Bernard Peek]

In message <11*********************@g14g2000cwa.googlegroups. com>, Dave
<da**********@gmail.com> writes

Sorry, I'm still unsure of how to apply your suggestion correctly.

Do I add all the text for a paragraph within the one text field?? i.e.:

([GivenName] & " "+[MInitial]& " "+[Surname])

Would look like this:
|
I, ([GivenName] & " "+[MInitial]& " "+[Surname]), agree to be bound by
the provisions of this Agreement and agree to determine by this
Agreement, in the event we cohabit and later.....blah, blah, blah. And
we contiune here.....
That's about it. You need to include all of the text for that paragraph.
That will make sure that there are no gaps either side of the places
where you insert the variable data

For clarity I would create some text variables to carry the boilerplate
text. So in this case you would have some text before the name, then
some more after the name. In my applications I would write some code to
do the concatenation. I would write a function that accepts the names
and the other text and concatenates them. That way I could easily use
the same code in different projects. The function would include some
code like this:

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
------

dim ForeMatter, AfterMatter, Para1 string

ForeMatter= "I, "

AfterMatter=", agree to be bound by the provisions of this Agreement and
agree to determine by this Agreement, in the event we cohabit and
later.....blah, blah, blah."

Para1=Forematter + [GivenName] +" " + [Minitial]&" " + [Surname]+
AfterMatter

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
---------

This takes you down to the end of the paragraph containing your
variables.

When the names are printed it is possible that the number of printed
lines will change. Long names might add an extra line to the paragraph.
So you need the following paragraph to print one line further down the
page. If you set the Can Grow property of the text box to true it will
be able to expand. That should move the following fields further down
the page.
How do I add the other text to the para...if you could further clarify,
that would be most helpful.

Following text boxes can be labels or more text boxes populated from the
database. If you intend to write many similar reports then it is worth
trying to find ways to automate parts of it by using code.

--
Bernard Peek
London, UK. DBA, Manager, Trainer & Author.

[Dave]

Thanks for all your help! I think that I'll review info on Word
Merges; they may apply and simplify my reporting needs.

Again, your patience's has been refreshing!

Have a safe and wonderful Christmas / Holiday Season!