Report Writer Enhancements in Visual FoxPro

• Microsoft Visual FoxPro for Windows, version 3.0

SUMMARY

The Visual FoxPro Report Designer has been updated to include many new features. These new features can be incorporated into new reports created in Visual FoxPro as well as into reports created in any previous version of FoxPro.

The following new features have been added to the Visual FoxPro Report Designer:

• Private data session
• Drag and drop
• On Entry and On Exit report band expressions
• System toolbars
• Report output to an ASCII text file

MORE INFORMATION

Private Data Session

By choosing Private Data Session from the Report menu, you can initialize a separate record pointer for the databases used in the report. This feature allows the report to be called from a form or program without affecting the record pointer for that session.

Drag and Drop

As with many other areas of the Visual FoxPro interface, the Report Designer now supports drag and drop. Fields or entire tables can be dragged from the data environment and dropped on the appropriate band on the report to create the report expressions. Likewise, fields or tables can be dragged from the Project Manager to achieve the same results.

On Entry and On Exit Report Band Expressions

The report band expressions provide a way to call a user-defined function at a specific time while the report is running. There is an On Entry and an On Exit band expression for each band in the report. Each expression is called once for every page in the report. As expected, the On Entry executes as the report processing enters a particular band while the On Exit executes as the report processing leaves a particular band. The band expressions for a given report band can be accessed by double-clicking the desired band.

System Toolbars

The Visual FoxPro Report Designer uses several system toolbars for creating reports. There are four system toolbars that relate to the Report Designer.

• The Report Designer toolbar helps you to create data groupings quickly and access the other three toolbars (Report Controls, Layout, and Color Palette).
• The Report Controls toolbar gives you quick access to the various controls that can be added to a report.
• The Layout toolbar enables you to adjust the layout of the various objects on the report. You can use it to center, align, and size the objects.
• The Print Preview toolbar helps you navigate through the pages of a report while previewing the report.

Report Output to an ASCII text file

The REPORT FORM command has been updated to include a new ASCII clause. This clause, used with the TO FILE clause, can be added to the report command to send the output to an ASCII text file devoid of printer-specific control codes or escape sequences. For example:

   REPORT FORM MYREPORT.FRX TO FILE MYFILE.TXT ASCII