Accessing Reporting Options in the Report Group

The Report group contains commands to enhance a report.

• Theme. Opens a dialog box where you can select a theme to style your report. You can use the default style sheet by clicking the Use Default Stylesheet button.

  You can also select a document styling theme or an application theme to style all reports created. Use the Environment and Styling section of the Options window, which is accessible by clicking Options in the Application main menu.

• Style. Opens the Report Style dialog box for applying global styling to the entire report. For more information about the Report Style dialog box, see Using the Report Style Dialog Box. For more information about styling reports, see Styling Report.
• Banded. Opens a Color dialog box for choosing a color that provides an alternating color scheme for the report. The report output displays alternating rows of data, using a white background for one row and a background of the selected color for the next row. This pattern continues throughout the report. For more information about the Color dialog box, see Using the Color Dialog Box. For more information about banded styling, see How to Style Rows of Data With Alternating Colors in a Report.
• Header & Footer. Opens the Header & Footer dialog box, from which you can add and style headings and footings.
  • For a report, you can add and style report headings, page headings, page footings, and report footings. In the dialog box, the tab for Report Header is active, by default.
  • For a chart, you can add and style page headings and page footings. Page Header is active, by default.
  • You can drag fields from the Data pane into the Header & Footer dialog box.

  Another way to access the Header & Footer dialog box is to click the down arrow next to the Header & Footer button. It opens a drop-down menu from which you can select the heading or footing that you want to work with (Report Header, Page Header, Page Footer, Report Footer). After you make your selection, the Header & Footer dialog box opens, and the heading or footing that you selected is active.

  From the Header & Footer dialog box, you can add and style the active heading or footing, or choose a different heading and footing to work with by selecting the applicable tab. You can switch among tabs, but InfoAssist does not save changes made on the tabs until you click Apply or OK. If you click Apply, the Header & Footer dialog box remains open. If you click OK, the dialog box closes.

  You can style a selected heading or footing using the options on the styling toolbar. From left to right, you can customize the font type, font size, and font style (bold, italic, or underline). You can justify text (left, center, or right), select the font color and background color, and restore styling settings to their default value from the template.

  You can also add page footings to your reports or charts. From the Header & Footer dialog box, select Page Footer. When working with reports, you may use the Additional alignment options icon , to specify whether you want to align the footer relative to the data (default) or relative to the page. The Align Relative to Data option places the footer directly below the data, and the Align Relative to Page option positions the footer at the bottom of the page. When working with charts, only the default page footer alignment option is supported.

  Note: The Align Relative to Page option works with reports that use positioned formats (for example, PDF, PS, DHTML, PPT, and PPTX).

  You can also insert quick text into a heading or footing. Quick text is supplied for you. It includes information that is typically useful in identifying a report or chart. From the preformatted text drop-down menu, you can select:

  • Draft
  • Page X of Y
  • Confidential
  • Date (multiple formats)
  • Time (multiple formats)
  • Created by (followed by a name)

  For charts, an icon on the far right of the styling ribbon is enabled. This icon provides two options for controlling the way in which the page heading and page footing are rendered. The default option, Create Header and Footer as text, renders the heading and footing as text elements that are separate from the chart image. The option, Embed Header and Footer in the chart, renders the heading and footing text as part of the chart image.

  Once you have added a heading or footing to a report or chart, you can double-click it on the canvas in design mode to reopen the Header & Footer dialog box. You can also right-click an existing heading or footing in design mode and click Edit from the menu to open the dialog box.

  For more information on adding and styling headings and footings, see How to Add Headings and Footings to a Report and Formatting Page Headings and Page Footings.

• Column Totals. (Reports only) Adds a grand total row to the bottom of the report to sum numeric data in each column. For more information, see How to Add Column Totals to a Report.
• Row Totals. (Reports only) Adds a grand total column to the right side of the report to sum numeric data in each row. For more information, see How to Add Row Totals to a Report.