Let's create an advanced layout for the Company Activity report we created in Lesson 1 of the tutorial. We want to create a 2-column report so more information fits on each page. First, click this report in the Reports Explorer and choose Edit. Go to Step 5, then turn on the Advanced Layout setting and click Edit. The Advanced Report Designer appears as shown below.

Let's start by moving the Order Amount and Order Type onto their own line. Drag the detail band's bar down to make room, then click the field under the Order Amount heading and drag it down to the start of the next row and do the same for Order Type. Move the detail band's bar until it's a little below the field. Drag the page header band's bar down to make room, then drag the lower line in the page header band down to make room. Click the Order Amount and Order Type headings and drag them down to the start of the next row. Move the lower line and page header band's bar until they're a little below the Order Amount and Order Type headings. The report now looks like this:

Next, choose Page Setup from the File menu and change the number of columns to 2. Click OK.

Select the column heading objects, choose Copy from the Edit menu, then choose Paste to create duplicates, and move the duplicates to the right of the originals. Move the page number object to the right edge of the window, and adjust the widths of the page header and page footer fields and the lines in the page header and summary bands so they cover the width of the report. Next add a horizontal line in the Detail band underneath the field objects. This will make it easier to read separate records. The report now looks like this:

Choose Print Preview from the Report menu to view the report; it looks like this:

Let's add a grey rectangle in the group header to make it stand out. To make room for the rectangle at the left, select all objects in the group header band by holding down the Shift key and double-clicking the grey bar for the band, then click one of them and drag slightly to the right. Now click the Rectangle object () in the Report Controls toolbar, click near the upper left corner of the group header band and drag to the lower right corner to draw a rectangle. Click the Background button () in the Color Palette, then click the light grey button to make that the fill color for the rectangle. Oops, the rectangle now completely covers the labels and fields in the band. Click the Send to Back button () to move the rectangle behind the other objects. The report now looks like this:

Let's add a logo to the report. To make room for the logo, click the grey bar for the Page Header band and drag it down. Select all the objects in that band by holding down the Shift key and double-clicking in the grey bar, then click one of them and drag down. Click the Picture button () in the Report Controls toolbar, then click near the upper left corner of the Page Header band and drag to the right down to about 1.5 inches deep. When the Report Picture dialog appears, click the button beside the text box for Image source and choose an image file. Choose the Scale Picture, Retain Shape option and choose OK. You can then rearrange the other objects in the Page Header band around the logo as desired.

Preview the report again. Here's the finished product:


© Stonefield Software Inc., 2023 • Updated: 08/29/18
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