? re: how subsummary reports work

[barryfh]

Hello,

Could someone please explain how come sorting and preview mode are needed for a subsummary to work?

Is this intuitively obvious and I'm missing it?

I've read pages 48 and 68 in FMP 8 User's Guide without spotting anything about this!

Otherwise, I am just doing this mechanically without understanding the underlying logic.

Thanks in advance and cheers!

[Genx]

Well hmmm...

Regarding preview mode, well that's an issue in it self.

As for the rest... A sub summary obviously needs to summarize a grouping of data right? Well here's the thing, the way you sort your data can result in different groupings (or can cancel out subsummaries part's entirley where you are using one report for multiple purposes). Unless you specify the particular sort order, the summary is more likely than not in fact going to return an incorrect grouping -- incorrect groupings = meaningless data = useless report.

Thats just a summary :)

[barryfh]

Hello Genx,

Many thanks for taking time to reply.

I understand that groupings are important for getting the proper summarization, but how come the sort order matters?

And how come Preview matters?

If these settings are important, it would be helpful for them to be documented in the User's Guide. Otherwise, how would (novice) users figure this out? Yes, I did submit an enhancement request on this to FileMaker, Inc.

Cheers!

Edited March 31, 2007 by Guest

[Genx]

Well, again, the sort order will determine the groupings and the way they are displayed won't it? You can have six sub summary parts, but opt only to use 3 of them in specifying your sort order. Or you may want to organize the information backwards.

An example:

You have a report that has two sub summary parts and groups people by the first letter of their name followed by their year of birth.

You can generate eight different reports that will appear entirely differently with this based on your sort order:

1) Sort Ascending by First Letter, Sort Ascending by year of birth:

Returns a report with people grouped first by the first letter of their name, then by their year of birth

2) Sort descending by First Letter, Sort Ascending by year of birth

3) Sort Ascending by First Letter, Sort Descending by year of birth

4) Sort descending by First Letter, Sort Descending by year of birth

5) Sort Ascending by First Letter only:

Produces a report where people are grouped only by the first letter of their name despite the presence of the year of birth sub summary section

6) Sort Descending by First Letter only

7) Sort Ascending by Year of Birth only

8) Sort Descending by Year of Birth only

Regarding Preview, It's just the way FileMaker works...

[barryfh]

Hello,

Many thanks for taking time again to reply.

I'm still having trouble getting in touch with this concept that the sort order makes a difference for a subsummary to function properly.

Maybe it has to do with my application of summary report.

The goal is to display the number of students, by month, participating in various events held during each month whereby some events in January (for instance) also happen in February while others happening in January are different from ones happening in February and vice versa.

How come the sorting by month, and/or by event, is required for the subsummary to display at all?

In a spreadsheet program (which I do understand functions differently from a database program), would sorting be required for the sums of selected rows within a given column to be computed properly and displayed? I think the sums would display regardless of sorting.

Cheers!

[Genx]

In a spreadsheet program (which I do understand functions differently from a database program), would sorting be required for the sums of selected rows within a given column to be computed properly and displayed? I think the sums would display regardless of sorting...

Dump the summary fields in the trailing grand summary, and your sums will be computed like wise -- Summary reports are nothing at all like standard calculations...

This is about where my knowledge on this ends though so if you want the complex nitty gritty answer on this, you'll have to wait for someone else to tell you why C++ (or C, i forget which FM was written in) works like it does or even why the FM engineers decided to do it that way.