Let's
practice the selection, moving and sizing techniques in the Details
section of our report, where we dropped the six fields we dragged from the Field
List above.
9.
Click the ProductID
compound control at any point.
The Sizing and Move handles appear for the ProductID
control pair.
10.
Hover the
cursor over the area to the immediate right of the second Move handle.
The cursor becomes a hand image.
11.
Click and drag
the ProductID compound control to a position approximately 1/4-inch on
the horizontal (across the top of the Design View) ruler; keep the
control as close to flush to the top of the Detail section as possible.
12.
Click the ProductName
compound control at any point.
The Sizing and Move handles appear for the ProductName
control pair.
13.
Hover the
cursor over the area to the immediate right of the second Move handle.
The cursor becomes a hand image.
14.
Click and drag
the ProductName compound control to the immediate right of, and aligned
with, the ProductID compound control.
15.
Drop the ProductName
compound control, as shown in partial view of the Detail section in Illustration
14.
Illustration 14: New
Placement of the ProductName Compound Control
16.
Click the
label control (the left control in the pair) for ProductID.
17.
Press the Delete
key.
The ProductID label disappears. We will likewise
remove the label controls from each of the fields we dragged into the Detail
section, as we do not want to show these in the report.
18.
Delete the
label controls for each of the remaining control pairs in the Detail
section of the report:
-
ProductName
-
UnitPrice
-
Quantity
-
Discount
-
NetOrder
The Detail
section of the report appears as shown in Illustration 15.
Illustration 15: The
Detail Section Controls - sans Labels
19.
Resize the ProductID
text control to have the right border touch the 1-1/4 inch horizontal
marker line (as we proceed, ensure that all Detail section controls are
placed snug against the top of the Detail section).
20.
Move the ProductName
control to align with ProductID vertically, with the ProductName
left border at the 1-1/4 inch horizontal marker line.
21.
Resize the ProductName
control, if required, so that its right border touches the 2-1/2 inch
horizontal marker line.
22.
Move the UnitPrice
control to touch ProductName's right border at the 2-1/2 inch horizontal
marker line.
23.
Resize the UnitPrice
control, as necessary, so that its right border touches the 3-inch horizontal
marker line.
24.
Position the Quantity
control so that its left edge touches the 3-1/4 inch horizontal marker line.
25.
Resize the Quantity
control, as necessary, so that its right border touches the 3-3/4 inch
horizontal marker line.
26.
Position the Discount
control so that its left edge touches the 4-inch horizontal marker line.
27.
Resize the Discount
control, as necessary, so that its right border touches the 4-1/2 inch
horizontal marker line.
28.
Position the Net
Order control so that its left edge touches the 4-3/4 inch horizontal
marker line. (The page will automatically widen as required.)
29.
Resize the Net
Order control, as necessary, so that its right border touches the 5-1/2
inch horizontal marker line.
Now let's
size the Detail section to ensure that our detail transactions are
presented in compact fashion.
30.
Move the
pointer to the bottom of the Detail section, placing it between the Detail
section and the OrderDate footer section.
The pointer becomes a "double-headed arrow,"
indicating that it is in position for dragging the Detail section border
to the desired position.
31.
Hold down the
left button on the mouse, as soon as the arrow image appears.
32.
Drag the Detail
section border up, until a tight fit is achieved for the controls we have
included.
33.
Release the
button to fix the border in place.
The Detail
section of the report now appears as depicted in Illustration 16.
Illustration 16: Detail
Section (Partial View) with Our Adjustments to the Border
We can
perform an ongoing preview of our evolving report through the use of the
Preview feature. Let's do so now, to get a feel for the effectiveness of our
design work thus far.
34.
Click the Print
Preview button (shown in Illustration 17) on the main toolbar.
Illustration 17: The
Print Preview Button
We are
prompted for an "As Of" date, via an Enter Parameter Value
dialog that appears, and which is initialized because of the logic we built
into our underlying data source, a query that we constructed in the first half
of this lesson. Recall that our intent with this query is to enable an
information consumer to generate the customer order information found in this
report "as of" any given date in time (or at least "as of"
any date that is included within the data itself). For more information
regarding the setup or reasoning behind the prompt, see Part I.
35.
Type the
following (a date which we know to be preceded in time with transactions,
within our database) into the AsOfDate box:
16-Oct-1996
The Enter
Parameter Value dialog appears, with our input, as shown in Illustration
18.
Illustration 18: The
Enter Parameter Value Dialog
36.
Click OK
to apply the date.
The
report executes, returning data that appears similar to that partially shown in
Illustration 19.
Illustration 19: The
Report Preview - Partial Detail Section
We
can see that the Detail section of the report is shaping up nicely and
that the data is appearing in accordance with our alignment and placement
intentions. The spaces that appear between the detail sections are due to the
placement of our header / footer sections, which are currently empty. We will
see in the next section how to populate, as appropriate, these sections.
37.
Click the Close
button to close the Preview window.
38.
Save your work
as desired, as a safety measure.
» 