The Report title is text that appears on the top of each page of the report. If the report title text is left blank, then no report title cell will appear on the report. The report title characteristics can be manipulated with the various formatting options that appear in the Report title section. The report title can contain either plain text or HTML tagging. If text such as <b>My <u>Report</u> Title</b> is entered, it will produce a title of My Report Title.

In addition to text and HTML, there are special replacement character references that allow the User to specify page numbering, data from within the report body, and numerous options for formatting the current date and time. More information can be found in the topic: referencing column information.

It is also possible to split the title text to appear in 3 segments as Left, Center, and Right justified. This is accomplished by using "||" to split the text. If Fred||Summary Report||Sales Dept is entered, then Fred will appear as left justified, Summary Report will appear in the center, and Sales Dept will be right justified in the title cell. This technique works for footer text as well.

Bold, Underline and Italic text formatting can be applied to the title cell by checking the appropriate checkboxes. Bold is checked as the default for the Report title.

General formatting, such as the font type, size, color, and background color can be applied to all of the Column headings as a single group. This area also contains a text input with a default value of "Pivoted<br />Columns" to allow for the input of a column heading when a "Pivot" column is selected in the Report Columns section of the  Layout  panel. If the User wishes to change the appearance of individual column headings, this can also be accomplished by embedding HTML tags into the specific columns as found in the Report Columns section.

Bold, Underline and Italic text formatting can be applied to all the column headings by checking the appropriate checkboxes.

The Report footer is text that appears on the bottom of each page of the report. If the report footer text is left blank, then no report footer cell will appear at the bottom of the report pages. The report footer characteristics can be manipulated with the various formatting options that appear in the Report footer section.

The same formatting options and characteristics available for the title can also be applied to the footer. Please see the Report title section above for more information. A common use for footer text is the entry of "Page &PN" to reference the page number.

Bold, Underline and Italic text formatting can be applied to the footer cell by checking the appropriate checkboxes.

Font faces, colors and other attributes can be set for all the data cells in a report using the controls in the Report Body section. Changing the alignment of text in specific columns can be accomplished using the alignment controls in the Report Columns section. The report body controls also provide many other options for controlling the appearance of the data cells in the report.

The Outer border setting allows the thickness of the borders to be specified that will be displayed around the report pages. The selections range from 0 to 10 pixels. Please note that Netscape Navigator 4.x is unable to center the report pages when a border size of 0 is set. The color of the border can be set using the "Outer border color" control.

The Inner border setting determines how thick the lines should be between data cells in a report. The selections range from 0 to 10 pixels. The color of these lines can be set using the "Inner border color" control.

The Section border size determines the line thickness that will delineate the report title and column headings from the report data. For table and pivot layouts, the column groupings will also be separated from the data with the selected section border size. The color of these lines is determined by the "Inner border color" setting.

The Inner border use controls whether the vertical, horizontal or both vertical and horizontal lines are displayed. To eliminate the display of all inner border lines, the Inner border size can be set to 0.

This value determines how many rows will be produced per "page set". A page set is the total number of rows of data to be displayed when a query is executed. For example, if a value of 500 is used in conjunction with a Rows per page value of 50, 10 pages of report output will be displayed at one time. When the number of rows produced by the query exceeds the Max displayed rows value, the User must click the appropriate navigation buttons (First, Back, More, Last) found above the report to move between page sets. A larger number will show more data, but it takes longer to display results, especially if a user is connected with a modem.

The number of rows displayed will not always be exactly equal to this setting, as subtotaling data will add additional rows to reports. QLR Manager will always complete the current page with data. If using a Max displayed rows value of 500 and the 500th row appears in the middle of the page, QLR Manager will fill up the final page with rows of data, if there is more data available.

Hint: To print a large report, or generate a PDF using a PDF writer such as Adobe Acrobat or CutePDF, this value can be set to a number of rows greater than the total rows expected to be produced by the query. If the Layout is saved as the same name as the query or wizard, it will automatically be applied when the query, wizard or menu item is executed.

This determines how many rows will be produced per page. If 0 is entered, no pagination is applied and will result in one continuous report page with one set of column headings, and one title or footer if applied. There are two other limiting factors that determine how large of a continuous report page can be created. These are the Max displayed rows above and the Maximum output file size setting applied when QLR Manager was installed. These values default to 500 rows and 5 MB.

This option sets the currency symbol that will be used when the $1,234.56 or $1.234,56 formatting options are chosen in the report column Format option. The $, £ or ¥ symbols can be used, or up to 4 text characters can be entered. If the User's keyboard cannot produce the £ or ¥ symbols, the characters can be copied and pasted from this help text.

The Currency symbol location determines whether the currency symbol should appear "Before" or "After" the values when a currency formatting option is selected.

Cell padding refers to the amount of space between the data in a report cell and the border of the cell. The selections range from 0 to 10 pixels. This setting is applied to all cells in the report, including the title, column headings and the footer.

The Date separator allows the User to specify which character will be used when displaying dates. This will work with all date formatting options that contain a "/", and the "Date Time" option. Dates such as 2001/31/12 can be displayed as 2001.31.12 if "." is chosen as the separator. It also controls the appearance of the &DT date reference options that can be used in titles, footers and break text.

This selection provides a means to layout multiple report tables horizontally. This can be useful if each report has only a few columns of data resulting in a narrow table. The selected number of reports can be generated from left to right and make more efficient use of the browser window.

With this option checked, a printed report will be produced with black text and table borders, and with the cell background colors removed. This allows for the creation of report output that is optimized for viewing and will save colored ink when printing. It does not affect the printing of charts which are images and will print as they are displayed.

There may be instances where Word wrap may be selected for a specific data column under Format or use in the Report Columns section. This will cause long lines of data to wrap within the confines of the specified column width. If the number of Rows per page have been defined to provide page breaks for printing, the additional rows created for wrapped data are not included in the row count and will likely cause printed page overruns. Selecting Adjust for wrapped data will attempt to estimate the additional rows created by the Word wrapped data to produce uniform sized pages for printing.

Note: This adjustment is only an approximation. There are many variables such as font metrics and other factors that determine how the data will wrap in a report column within the client's browser.

Alternate row coloring produces a "striped" report appearance. When checked, every other row is colored with the Report Body "Data row colors". The alternate rows are colored white.

When checked, all negative numbers in the body of the report will be displayed in red.

Reports that contain HTML tags within the data will display with the tagging rendered by the browser as the default. For example, if a field contains <u>My Information</u>, it will be displayed in the report as My Information. If "Show HTML tags" is checked, it will instead be displayed as <u>My Information</u>.

When checked, the columns in a Standard report format are automatically arranged so that the Break columns appear on the left, followed by the Group columns. All columns that contain other actions, such as Sum, appear on the right side of the report. This has no impact on Table or Pivot Layouts.

When Table and Pivot Layouts are created, the entries that are spread across the page for these two report formats are sorted alphabetically. If the ignore option is checked, and the Format type of the chosen Table or Pivot column is "General", then the order of the data being spread across the page will be the order of the data as found in the report rows.

When Fill page with rows is set to "Yes", QLR Manager will fill the balance of each page with as many rows necessary to meet the number of rows set in the Rows per page option. This will create uniform sized pages throughout a report. If Alternate row coloring is checked, the filler rows will alternate between white and the specified "Data row colors". The color of the filler rows can be modified using the "Color" or "White" selections.

Report Breaks allow the User to define groupings within the report to either visually separate data, or for subtotaling, counting, and other Actions. Breaks are triggered when the data value in the break column changes from one row to the next. Proper use of breaks is dependent upon how the query sorted the report data.

Up to 5 levels of breaks can be defined and they are nested to provide a "break within a break". More than one column of data can also be used to define a single break. An example might be report columns for both "State" and "City" set as "Break1".

Bold, Underline and Italic text formatting can be applied to break text by checking the appropriate checkboxes. Bold is checked as the default for report breaks. Font and background colors can also be applied by launching the appropriate color selector. The break text can contain either plain text or HTML tagging.

The leading break text is the text that will appear prior to the start of a new break section. The space allotted to this text spans the width of the report.

The trailing break text is the text that will appear on the corresponding break line that is added into the report. The amount of column space that is allocated to the break text is dependent upon the first column of data that is encountered that has an activity that the break needs to display. For example, if the User is using the Sum action in the 4th column, the break text will span the first 3 columns of the report. The 4th column will be used to display the sum amount.

If there are no actions for a break to act upon, such as "Sum", etc., the break text will still appear in the report. If the break text is blank, the break row will not be displayed. This allows for data outlining without empty report rows being added to the report.

If it is desired to exclude the text at the break from displaying, but still include the spacing at the break, enter the tag of <omit> as the break text.

Custom break text can be entered, allowing for great flexibility in report creation. A classic example is to "stack" several break level items on top of each other, such as adding taxes to the bottom of an invoice.

The following is an example of how to modify a typical report, with data in separate columns, into a report that has stacked data at the break. Suppose the original report looks as follows:

A simple example of adding plain text to the break on a separate line that spans across the entire report by changing the break text:

Notice the use of "||" as the indicator that custom text follows the normal break text input. An additional row in the report is created that spans the width of the report:

The steps involved to "stack" the tax information directly below the purchase price information:

Some important notes regarding this example:

The  Layout  panel provides the User with the capability of including column data in a report's Break text fields, as well as the Report title and Report footer. For example, suppose the report is a list of employees that is sorted by the state in which they are employed. A break is desired to sum the "Total for state XX", with XX being the state on which the break is based. This can be accomplished by entering the following into the Break #1 "Text at the break":

Total for state &C1

This triggers QLR manager to replace &C1 with the data in the CURRENT record at the time of the break, with report column number 1's data. If column number 1 in the report is the state, and the value is "NY" at the time of the break, this would result in:

Total for state NY

If it is desired to reference the data in the NEXT record coming up in the report, &N1 would reference the data from the first column in the next record. This is useful when it is desired to reference information in the Report title.

Multiple references can be used in the text, such as "State &C1", "City &C4 employee count" is acceptable.

Either upper case or lower case C's and N's can be used as a reference.

The current break level data can also be referenced using &BXX or &bxx. It assumes that an "Action", such as Sum, Count, etc., has been performed on the referenced column to produce break level information. An example of such usage might be to count the number of items (for example in column 4) in a break section and then the "Text at the break" for "Break #1" might be:

Number of entries &b4

This approach also works if column 4 had been hidden by setting the display width to zero. By setting the display width = 0, the column "Action" can be set = Count. An alternate way of hiding a column is with the Hide Action. But using this approach would not allow for the Count action to have been applied to the column.

Note: The use of reference values in Break text can be used in conjunction with the BreakxH (hidden break action) or the Hide Action to display information in a report break, but not take up space as a column in the report. More information about Actions is available in the Report Columns section.

In addition to referencing column data, query variables can also be referenced. Suppose a query contains a query variable called {customer_number} used with MS SQL Server only, [customer_number] for other supported databases, or the older method of **customer_number. The User supplied value for this variable can be referenced in the report title by adding the text {customer_number} for MS SQL Server or [customer_number] into the title at the desired location. The value provided for this variable will be substituted for the variable name. Note that the variable name must be enclosed in brackets or start with ** (older method) as found in the query text or wizard filter set. If the @ length parameter is used in the query variable, it is not used when referencing the query variable name in the Layout.

When the string eval([formula]) is added to header, footer or break text, its content is evaluated as a formula. The column referencing technique described above can be used in the formula. PHP code can also be used in the formula in the same manner that the Evaluated formulas work. Some examples:

If the parenthesis () do not pair up properly in the formula, a message "!_paren_error" will be displayed in the replacement text.

Page numbering can be added (usually in the footer), by including &pn or &PN in the appropriate layout input field.

The current server date or time can be added by using &DTx or &dtx, where the "x" represents a specific type of date formatting. These format options can be found in the Date formatting section.

The Final text is text printed at the end of the report. It is only printed when an Action is present to create a final row of data, such as a Count or Sum. The replacement value referencing described above can be used for final text. In addition, final calculated values can be accessed by the use of &fx or &Fx. These references can also be used prior to the final break section (such as in break level text), and will render the calculated value at the time it is called, such as cumulative summing.

The alignment of all levels of break text is controlled by this Alignment setting. Valid choices are Left, Center or Right. There are two different settings: One that controls the text that appears before a break, and one to control the text that appears at the break.

The Outlining checkboxes specify whether the values within a break column are blank in the following row of data, or if the same data is repeated. All new break sections and the beginning of pages will display the column value even if outlining is set to "Yes". Outlining can be controlled for each break level.

The "Show final checkbox" determines whether the final text/grand total information is displayed. If subtotals exist for breaks and the grand total is not desired at the bottom of the report, this value can be unchecked.

This determines how many blank lines will appear after the associated Break level is triggered. It is also possible to specify that a new page be printed. The new page feature is not supported in Netscape Navigator 4.x.

When checked, the break text will be permitted to word wrap within the cell.

When checked, the break text colors as specified in the color controls are used. When not checked, the overall row coloring scheme is used.

When checked, break information will be displayed even if there is only a single row of data in the current break. When unchecked, breaks with only one row of data will not produce break text, producing much "tighter" report output.

Please reference the separate topic about Report Charting.

A Custom Layout is created by entering text into the "Custom Layout" section of the  Layout  panel. This text may contain HTML tagging. QLR Manager allows the User to reference individual data fields, break level data, an entire report, and charts for inclusion in the custom output that is generated.

The Custom Layout section is intended to provide the User with "freeform" control over the formatting of output using HTML tagging. This is particularly useful to generate e-mails to multiple recipients, each with specific information related to the addressee. More information about this capability is provided in the Distribution e-mail topic below. Following is a description of the controls in this section:

If e-mail fields have been identified in the Report Columns section, this option determines the number of e-mails to display at one time.

When checked, QLR Manager applies the text that has been entered to create a custom report. If not checked, the custom text is ignored. This allows for easy toggling between viewing the custom report based on the custom text and viewing a normal tabular style report.

There are three font settings that can be applied to the custom text on a global basis. These are the font face, color and size. If the User wants complete control over the appearance of their custom report, they can uncheck this option and include their own HTML tagging.

This is the text area where the actual Custom Layout text is entered. HTML tagging can be entered to produce a freeform layout with <report> and <chart> objects nested as desired. Replacement value references can also be used.

If the text "This is custom text" is entered into the Custom Layout Text and HTML text area and the checkbox is selected to Use Custom Layout Text and HTML, the following output will be produced:

This is actually useless output, but it demonstrates how the entered text is generated for each row in the report. The blank spacing between rows is controlled by the Spacing after break setting.

If the text "This is custom text for &c3 &c2" is entered into the custom text area, it will produce the output:

The data for columns 2 and 3 in the report have been added using the column referencing technique.

If the following text and HTML is entered into the custom text area:

The resulting output will look like this:

Distribution e-mail output is created when one or more fields are selected for use as an e-mail address in the Report Columns section of the  Layout  panel. This designation is applied by choosing either "Email to:", "Email cc:" or "Email bcc:" as the Format or use selection. These e-mail choices only appear when the report column is a data type of text. In order for a distribution e-mail to occur, at least one field must be designated with an "Email to:" selection. Multiple entries for Email to, Email cc and Email bcc can be chosen. Any change in the e-mail addresses associated with chosen fields will trigger a new e-mail to be produced.

The actual sending of distribution e-mails is initiated by either choosing the E-mail distribution option in the Report Tools window or by specifying an Output type of "Distributed email" in the E-mail Specifications section of the Define Macro panel. Both options require that the hosting server is running Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP).

Distribution e-mails go hand in hand with custom report layouts. It would be very rare to define a distribution e-mail and not use a Custom Layout. Additionally, distribution e-mails impact the way in which data is presented in a Custom Layout. When a new set of e-mail addresses is encountered, QLR Manager forces the page to end. For example, if the following text is entered into the Custom Layout Text and HTML text area:

The output resulting from a format of "Email to:" selected for column 1 would look like this:

The Report Columns section of the  Layout  panel contains the most important selections for formatting a report. The options presented provide the User with extensive control over the appearance of the report and format of the data.

The Heading text is the text to be displayed at the top of each column. The default value is the column name selected in the query. A multiple line heading can be created by using the HTML break tag, <br />, or by using the underscore ( _ ) character. The "_" will be interpreted as the HTML break. Database column names that include "_" will therefore automatically appear on multiple lines. Both "First_Name" and "First<br />Name" will result in a column heading of:

First
Name

Each column as selected in the query is listed as a row of information in the Report Columns section.

HTML tagging can be used in the Heading text field as well, such as <u> to underline the text.

General formatting, such as the font type, size, color, and background color can be applied to all of the columns as a single group. These settings are found in the Column headings area of the Titles & Footers section.

The order that columns of data appear in a report is based upon the order that they appear in the query that produced the report. This order can be changed by entering a value for Display order. If the User wishes to move two columns from the middle of the report to the left edge of the report, this can be accomplished by entering 1 and 2 into the two columns to be moved. To move columns to the end (right side) of a report, use a display order of greater than 1000 to move them to the right, such as 1001 and 1002. All columns that are not given a display order value will remain in their original position.

This attribute controls how data will be displayed in a report column, either Left, Right, or Centered. The Auto (default) selection will automatically display character data to the Left and numeric data to the Right.

This attribute controls the vertical alignment of data in a report column. Data can be vertically aligned to the Top, Middle or Bottom of its table cell.

There are numerous actions that can be performed to manipulate column data in a report layout:

Formatting provides control over how the data in a report field appears. The available formatting options depend on the type of data selected in the query. There are 3 basic types of data for formatting. These types are character, numeric and date/time data.

Character data can be formatted as follows:

Numeric data can be formatted as follows:

Date and Time data can be formatted as follows:

In addition to formatting data in the column of a report, these options can be used to include the server's current date or time in the Report's Title, Footer or Breaks by using the replacement strings as listed with each option. See referencing column information for more information about replacement reference values.

Note: The Date separator option found in the Report Body section determines the character displayed as the separator for the selected format.

The number of decimal places to be displayed for numeric data. 0 to 9 decimal places can be set. The "Auto" setting will automatically float the number to however many decimal places the number produces.

The Column width sets the approximate number of characters to display in the column. If set to blank or zero (0), the column will not be displayed in the report. Text will only be wrapped within the cell if Word wrap is selected for the "Format or use". The values for the column widths are calculated based on the largest value found in the column, either its data or the column title. The calculation is an approximation based on the font size, font type and character count. It is not an exact number. Using a monospace font such as Courier 10pt will map the character count close to the calculated size.

The Chart use selections specify which columns to use as Labels or data Plots for a graph. Please reference the separate topic about Report Charting for more information.

Report links allow for the launching of a new report, based on an existing query and layout, by clicking a link within a report. The link text is passed as a query variable to the query associated with the link. Links can be defined by clicking on the Create/Edit Report Links icon found in this Report Columns section of the  Layout  panel.

Links are applied by assigning an existing link to a layout column. Both the Link owner and Link name must be entered. When mapping a link, the column number in the layout to which that link applies must be selected. This is accomplished by using the Col # selections found to the left of the Link owner field. If report links have been previously defined, they can be accessed by clicking the button.

See Linked Reports for more information about how links are defined.

QLR Manager is written in a language called PHP. The evaluated formula area allows the User to define a valid PHP command to be executed using the PHP eval() function. The variable name that represents the data to be displayed in that field is named $value.

Note: Formula evaluation takes place prior to data formatting options being applied to the data. Although this provides greater user control, it may result in some formatting issues that can be overcome by formatting the data in the formula itself. Here are some examples of how to manipulate data in the field. The evaluated formula only changes the way the data is displayed, not its underlying value.

When defining an evaluated formula, the column number in the layout to which that formula applies must be selected. This is accomplished by using the Col # selections found to the left of the Link owner field.

if ($val[3]=='doyle') $value='<font color="red">'.$value.'</font>'

if ($val[2] != $pval[2]) $value='This is a new customer number'

Evaluated formulas will also calculate at the break and final levels as long as certain conditions are met. There cannot be any Action assigned to the column that contains the Evaluated Formula and all columns that are referenced in the formula must have an Action which produces data at the break level to perform the calculation.

Please reference the PHP manual for a full list of available functions.

A Table layout is a powerful layout action. It allows the User to create two dimensional reports by taking the data values found in the column specified with the Table or Table- action and create new report columns for each of these values, spreading them horizontally across the page. For example, if a column exists that contains a category code for each of the items in an order, a Table style layout could be created with a column to "Sum" both the inventory value and the quantity of items for each category, and tabulate the totals for each. The Table action will also produce Total columns on the right hand side of the report. A Table- layout will be minus these Total columns.

A sample report of data prior to Table formatting could look as follows:

When the Action selections are changed in the Report Columns section of the Layout as depicted below, a Table layout report is produced:

The resulting report is a Table layout:

A Pivoted layout is similar to a Table layout in that it spreads the "Pivot" column values horizontally across the page. But unlike the Table layout which creates a column for each of the fields that contain a form Action such as Sum, a Pivoted layout creates a row of data for each of the fields that are assigned a layout action.

In the following example, a simple set of data has been selected and formatted with a Break #1 on the Region, and Sum for the Plan and Actual columns:

To illustrate the difference between the Table layout and the Pivot layout, the above report was formatted using a Table layout. Only the first 3 months are shown to limit the width of the example. An Action of Table was selected for the Month column and Group was selected for the Qtr, resulting in the following report:

The following report is produced:

Notice how both the Plan and action columns' data are rotated and displayed horizontally. Also notice how columns without an action (in this case, the Qtr column) are not part of the report. To include a column, the Group action can be used. Also, the text above the pivoted columns is displayed as "Pivoted Columns". This can be changed to the desired value ("Data" in the following example) by updating the appropriate field in the Column headings area of the Titles and Footers section:

To add a finishing touch, a title was added and the "Use break coloring" check box was checked, with the title colors applied to the Break text: