Color detail fields based on ppVariable in surrounding group

rbuser

Hi All,

I have a report where order lines are printed. All records are printed in
the detail band. The surrounding group is based on the order number and is
only used to break and reset variables.

If (at least) one of the order lines has a specific property set, I want to
color the amount field of all order lines belonging to the same order
yellow. Normally the amount field color is white.

My approach was using a lookahead boolean variable calculated on traversal
and reset on group end, indicating which color to use. If I print this
variable in the detail band it prints the correct value. Only I can't use
this value to set the color of another field.

Example (specific property is [X])

ppVariable (lookahead)
------------------------------------------------------------
order 1 [ ] FALSE --> white
order 1 [ ] FALSE --> white
order 2 [X] TRUE --> yellow
order 2 [ ] TRUE --> stays yellow
order 3 [ ] TRUE --> white
*** but I would like it to be yellow :-(
order 3 [X] TRUE --> yellow
order 3 [ ] TRUE --> yellow

Who has a solution to this problem?

Some additional info: Data is (of course) sorted on order number. report is
2-pass. using RB 7.03 and RAP.

Thanks in advance,
Jeroen Rottink

nicocizik

Hi Jeroen,

The problem is that ReportBuilder was not designed to traverse a dataset and
create drawcommands for each report object in a separate instance during
generation. This would be the only way to solve this issue inside the
report. The easiest way to work around this issue would be to either order
your data so that if an order does in fact have a record with the specific
property set to True, it is the first record traversed, or traverse the
dataset manually before calling Report.Print, creating a list of orders that
need to be yellow. Then using the DetailBand.BeforePrint event, changing
the color of the report componentes based on which order you are on.

--