Aaahhh!

I've just spend days creating this relational database that has an portal on an "invoice" table showing what employees (and their hours and rates), as pulled from a timesheet table, comprise this invoice. What I need to do now is print invoices that show this employee/hours/rate/subtotal portal. It works fine unless I have more employees on a job than will display on one page. In that case, only the records that fit in the portal display.

I found a tech note on filemakers site (104457) that talks about multiple page portal printing, but it's really really cumbersome, scary, and old (six years old).

I've also read something about printing from portals is bad and one should only print from the original table, not from a related table with a portal. (Then what's the use of portals, I ask?)

I've also read something about creating a parent/child relationship so that one displays and prints a child record, not the parent portal records. This, unfortunately, I don't understand.

Can someone shed some light on printing a layout that has a portal containing a variable number of lines and therefore may need to spread to two or more pages?

Thank you.

FileMaker Version: 7

Platform: Mac OS X Jaguar

You should be able to have large portals that extend through multiple pages. Then select the portal and turn on Sliding up based on all above and Reduce size of enclosing part.

I haven't tested this in FM7 for bugs (I know FM3 had some portal printing bugs at first,) but it's supposed to work.

This looks like it's going to work. Thank you very much!

One question, is it possible to change the characteristics of the line between the portal rows?

Change the line fill pattern of the portal to [empty], then draw your own lines.

I've messed with the multi-page portal in the way we've been discussing, but the result still seems less than ideal, with the pages breaking somewhere other than precisely on the line in between portal rows. Someone elsewhere said something about portals ought not be used for printing, just viewing, and it's better to form some kind of parent/child relationship with the portal data and print from that relationship, not from the portal. This sounds interesting, but I don't understand what this person was talking about. Does anyone else out there understand what this person is suggesting and can you direct me to a source where I can learn how to set up such a parent/child relationship?

In the child file (where the portal row data is stored), you can create a layout with summary parts. Summary layouts are ideal for most types of reports. I recommend you check out the user manual for an introduction to sub-summaries. If you need more help, you can check or ask Layouts forum.

Rocky,

I do this all the time. What you need to do is set up a second layout and a script that shows related records. Check out the attached file (compressed with StuffIt

Thank you for posting the example. FMP7 is telling me that the db is password protected when I attempt to open it, however.

The Otter,

I would love to view your attachment but it is asking for a username and password. Is there a fee for that information?

Carl