I wonder if anyone could point out a more stylish way to handle this basic problem of sliding layout items in a printed report:

In those records where the text exceeds the basic boundaries, is there another way to establish grid lines and borders (as you can see) but covering the dynamic blank space? Ideally, you could tell the lines to shrink as well, but I don't think it works that way. I would love to see some examples of graphically successful sliding objects.

Thanks for any ideas.

I wonder if anyone could point out a more stylish way to handle this basic problem of sliding layout items in a printed report:

In those records where the text exceeds the basic boundaries, is there another way to establish grid lines and borders (as you can see) but covering the dynamic blank space? Ideally, you could tell the lines to shrink as well, but I don't think it works that way. I would love to see some examples of graphically successful sliding objects.

Thanks for any ideas.

The only way I have found to make the vertical lines work when you have variable long text to accommodate is to make it a calculation based on the number of characters. You can make the number of lines of the border part of a case statement.

In my situation, I use VerticalLine (a couple of pix wide field with a left or right border turned on) placed across the entire grid, and once I get it more or less aligned I group all the vertical lines and send them to the back. This way every time you add a return (a new line to the field, you get another couple cm of border). It takes a little while to get the length right and it helps if you keep consistent the font and size of the font in the field with the variable notes. It seems like a pain, but in fact it works and it isn't that bad. In my case I had to examine a couple of fields across the grid to determine which would drive the need to make the row larger or smaller, in your case it looks like you only have to measure one field to see how long it is.

Case(

MaxLength≤40; Replace(VerticalLine;1;1; ¶);

MaxLength>40 and MaxLength≤80; Replace(VerticalLine;1;2; ¶ & ¶);

MaxLength>80 and MaxLength≤120; Replace(VerticalLine;1;3; ¶ & ¶ & ¶);

MaxLength>120 and MaxLength≤160; Replace(VerticalLine;1;4; ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶);

MaxLength>160 and MaxLength≤200; Replace(VerticalLine;1;5; ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶);

MaxLength>220 and MaxLength≤264; Replace(VerticalLine;1;6; ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶);

MaxLength>264 and MaxLength≤308; Replace(VerticalLine;1;7; ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶);

MaxLength>200 and MaxLength≤352; Replace(VerticalLine;1;8; ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶);

)

The only way I have found to make the vertical lines work when you have variable long text to accommodate is to make it a calculation based on the number of characters. You can make the number of lines of the border part of a case statement.

Very clever—I'll try that. At the moment, I have the vertical lines in my grid just barely extending past the part boundaries and it's working about 95% as a good solution, only the lines show at the bottom of each list of records in list view. Thanks for that.

The only way I have found to make the vertical lines work when you have variable long text to accommodate is to make it a calculation based on the number of characters. You can make the number of lines of the border part of a case statement.

In my situation, I use VerticalLine (a couple of pix wide field with a left or right border turned on) placed across the entire grid, and once I get it more or less aligned I group all the vertical lines and send them to the back. This way every time you add a return (a new line to the field, you get another couple cm of border). It takes a little while to get the length right and it helps if you keep consistent the font and size of the font in the field with the variable notes. It seems like a pain, but in fact it works and it isn't that bad. In my case I had to examine a couple of fields across the grid to determine which would drive the need to make the row larger or smaller, in your case it looks like you only have to measure one field to see how long it is.

Case(

MaxLength≤40; Replace(VerticalLine;1;1; ¶);

MaxLength>40 and MaxLength≤80; Replace(VerticalLine;1;2; ¶ & ¶);

MaxLength>80 and MaxLength≤120; Replace(VerticalLine;1;3; ¶ & ¶ & ¶);

MaxLength>120 and MaxLength≤160; Replace(VerticalLine;1;4; ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶);

MaxLength>160 and MaxLength≤200; Replace(VerticalLine;1;5; ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶);

MaxLength>220 and MaxLength≤264; Replace(VerticalLine;1;6; ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶);

MaxLength>264 and MaxLength≤308; Replace(VerticalLine;1;7; ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶);

MaxLength>200 and MaxLength≤352; Replace(VerticalLine;1;8; ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶ & ¶);

)

I'm trying to do this in a report as well, but I still don't get the steps involved. Can you explain further or supply an example file?

If I understand that you want all of the vertical lines to fill the vertical space then you could set the boarders on your expanding text field and then duplicate it for each column, set it to the width of each column, set the text to white and place it behind your other fields. This would shrink like the actual expanding text field but because the text is white it will not appear.

I have not tried this but it might do what you want.

Edit:

Did a quick test and it looks like you would need to keep all of the duplicates of the expanding text field the same width otherwise they would resize differently and then align the left edge in line with the left edge of each column.

Here is the quick sample file that I built. I set the duplicate text boxes green to so you can see what is going on better and added a yellow box in behind to give me a right boarder for smaller text amounts but you could probably keep your vertical lines.

Text Slide.fp7.zip

Here is the quick sample file that I built. I set the duplicate text boxes green to so you can see what is going on better and added a yellow box in behind to give me a right boarder for smaller text amounts but you could probably keep your vertical lines.

Thanks for taking time to do that. I can see how that works if one only has a single field column that has the most text. I'm dealing with any of the field columns having varying lengths depending how much text is in each. I have attached a screenshot of an example. How would you handle this situation?

If you duplicate each set of boxes and keep them the same width you place them at the edges of all the other boxes.

I have attached another example and colour coded each set of fields to make them easier to pick out but you would set them all to a fill of white and the text to white. If you dig down there are several layers of fields.

You also need to turn off borders on some edges and I placed a line at the bottom and turned off field boarders on the bottom.

Text Slide2.fp7.zip

I just noticed that the top level field "One" should have the bottom field boarder turned back on in order for it to appear correctly.