Slicky Tricky Layout Problem

[OneStop]

There are 5 SETS of the fields shown on this capture (Excluding "TOTAL DUE

THIS INVOICE" and "THANKS FOR YOUR BUSINESS)

The intent is to let the user make an outline of costs using pull-down lists

in the (Underlined) heading ("Creative and Production Services"), then

entering a description of the costs in the text field below ("Agency

consulting fee for Dec...")

A row of repeating fields on the left (1000...) will be used to enter a Job

Number where appropriate.

A row of repeating fields on the right ($ 300...) will be used to enter a

cost amount for that entry where appropriate.

At the bottom, the (bold) heading now marked "accessible power" is another

heading which will be filled by a pull-down list that would, in this case

say something like "Creative and Production Services TOTAL".

The field beside it is a total of the cost amounts from the repeating fields

above.

There are 5 SETS of these fields running down the page. At the bottom of the

page is the

"TOTAL DUE THIS INVOICE" which is the Grand Total of all the individual

charges and "THANKS FOR YOUR BUSINESS".

The description fields can be of varying lengths so the fields are set to

slide the copy. Our problem has been in formatting/positioning these fields

so that the page breaks do'nt split the copy or a heading as it runs across.

[Ender]

The best solution for invoices is to use a relational design. An Invoice table is related to a Line Item table by Invoice number. The data entry is done on a layout based on the Invoice table through a Line Item portal. The print layout is actually a list layout based on the Line Item table.

This works much better than trying to print long repeating fields or portals across page breaks because list layouts behave correctly when printing over page breaks.

Other benefits of a relational design: you won't be limited to a fixed number of rows, you can do summary reports on subsets of Line Items, and you can automatically adjust product inventory as items are used in Line Items.

[OneStop]

I appreciate your response and I agree that is the best way to create invoices...unfortunately in this instance..the client requires this particular setup for long and varied reasons. Job numbers can't be assigned from within the database....they are assigned after the creation of the invoice from an internal system and notes must be added manually at the point of creation of the invoice...believe me this is not how we would have designed this particular system were it not for client restraints in changing how they manage their invoices....

The "invoice" picture you see is actually a combination of several invoices brought together in one layout. The client has to add sometimes up to two or three pages of description for one line item...I should have noted in the attached graphic that the entire layout is six pages long with six text fields spanning the length of each page...the problem has been in lining up an "arbitrary job number" that is added last with a line item charge for each item lining up with the description of each new line item...very absurd way of doing it, I know...but our problem comes in with sliding...the Job Number..Item Description and Item Charges has to line up on the page....problem is ..the text field can sometimes be pages long before a new category or line item...thet don't exactly slide precisely and lining everything up with such a variable text field...has been quite the challenge...