The File Menu
This section contains descriptions of the commands found in Report Designer's File menu.
New...
Use this command to create a new, blank report. The Report Properties screen (below) will appear allowing you to select a default printer and connect to a database.
Open...
This command allows you to load an existing report for editing.
Reopen
This command displays a list of recently opened reports.
Save
Choose this command to save changes made to your report. (Closing a modified report will automatically prompt you to save your work.) If you choose not to Save your work, it will be lost once the editing window is closed.
If this is a new report that has not previously been saved, you will be prompted to specify a file name.
Save As...
Use this command to save a report using a different file name. If you select a file name which already exists, Report Designer will ask for confirmation before replacing the existing file.
Note: Report file names should end with the file extension “.dbr”.
Use this screen to select a default printer and connect to a database.
The Printer selected here is used to calculate the available paper sizes and print margins. This specific printer is used only for design and testing purposes and is not required to print the report. However, you should keep in mind that the features and capabilities of different printer models can vary widely.
Selecting a Database Source is optional, but will make designing your report much easier as it will allow you to quickly select tables and fields and preview your report. The database source is used only for layout design and testing purposes, and will not be used for the actual report generated from your VisualNEO for Windows publication. Therefore, the database source specified here must represent the location of the database on your development PC. Since Report Designer operates outside the context of VisualNEO for Windows, you cannot use variables, such as [PubDir], here. However, if you want your report to be portable, you can replace the path to the database file with "%SourceDir%". For example:
Provider=Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0
Data Source=%SourceDir%\AddressBook.mdb
This will allow you to move the report file to another folder or PC while maintaining the correct path to the database file. When editing the report, Report Designer will replace %SourceDir% with the folder where the report .dbr file resides. This only affects reports loaded into Report Designer and has no affect on reports generated from your VisualNEO for Windows publications.
The Import Database ID button can be used to retrieve connection strings from NeoDBpro, but you will need to remove any references to [PubDir] and other variables and replace them with literal paths or %SourceDir%.
See Opening a Database in the NeoDBpro help file for more information about data sources and creating connection strings.
Use this command to display a preview of your report. The quality of the preview will depend on several factors including the Database Source (above) and the data in your database. If your report depends on tables being sorted or queried in a particular way, then it's likely that the preview won't look quite right. Since Report Designer is not part of VisualNEO for Windows, it's impossible to exactly simulate the methods your publication uses to manipulate the database. In most cases, however, you can overcome this problem by opening a copy of Report Designer and a test copy of your publication (run from VisualNEO for Windows) side-by-side. This will allow you to make changes to your report and test them immediately in your publication using all of the data manipulation features of NeoDBpro.
Exit
This command closes Report Designer.