Need help printing badges

[Res]

I'm putting together the registration database for a convention run by an all volunteer non profit organization and I'm having a bit of a problem. I'm using a pop up value list to choose the type of membership for the attendee(Full weekend, Saturday only, etc.) and I'm using three other radio button value list to add on special events to the membership.

The problem is that I need to print badges for the attendees that are modified by the membership type and any special event add-ons, and I just can't figure out how to do it.

The badge needs to be:

Type of membership

attendee name

Special events

I also have to print the badge in red if it is going to someone under 21.

Thanks in advance for any and all help.

[CobaltSky]

When you are creating a layout from which to print your labels, you will be able to include the fields for type of membership and special events, without attaching their value lists (ie just as standard fields). Whatever has been selected in the value lists on your data entry layout will then appear as text on the badges.

The requirement to print in red if the attendee is under 21 is also not too difficult, assuming that you have the attendee's age or date of birth stored somewhere in the record. If so, I suggest that you create three unstored calculation fields with formulae along the lines of:

Case(Attendee_Age < 21, Type_of_Membership)

Case(Attendee_Age < 21, Attendee_Name)

Case(Attendee_Age < 21, Special_Events)

Then format these fields with the same font face and size as the fields on your badge layout, but give then red text color attributes, and transparent fill, then stack them exactly on top of the existing text fields.

That way whenever the attendee is under 21, the red text will be superimposed over the original (black) text, but in all other cases, the black text will show through.

[Res]

Thanks, I have that working, but now I have another problem.

There is a background image that needs to be printed in color for some of the badges and grayscale for others. Anyone know the best way to accomplish this?

Once again thanks in advance.

[CobaltSky]

Hi Res,

You've not said how it can be determined which badges should be in color and which in grayscale, but I assume that you have some way of telling from the data - or that if not, you will create a field which allows you to select color or grayscale for each record.

That being the case, I suggest that you create two global container fields called gColoredBg and gGrayscaleBg and place your two background graphics into them. Then create an unstored calculation with a result type of container, and with a formula along the lines of:

Case(YourCriteriaForColorHere, gColoredBg, gGrayscaleBg)

Then place the calculating field on your labels layout, turn off 'Allow entry onto field', size it appropriately, send it to the back and position it behind your text fields. You might also find it helpful to set the graphic format attributes to 'Crop' to ensure that the graphics are not scaled or distorted in any way.

That should do it. The appropriate image format (according to whatever criteria you have specified in the formula) will appear on each label.

BTW once you've pasted the images into the two global container fields, they can then be removed from the layouts - you won't need to see or access them directly again, unless you want to update the background images.

[Res]

Thanks for the help CobaltSky -- it looks like I finally have all the printing problems resolved.