Simple question: If there are no portal records, is it possible to display a message in the portal to indicate that? I'm sure there is already a thread answering this, but I can't find it.

You can overlay the top portal row with text (with transparent background) with your message. Use conditional formatting on the text box then to set the font to custom size 500 with this formula:

not IsEmpty ( child::childID )

... where child and child ID is your table occurrence name and ID on the portal. If you Arrange > Bring to Front this new text object, you can still enter the fields behind it. The text box will then disappear if there are records in the portal so you can read them.

Added: I forgot to mention that the text box must be considered 'outside' of the portal so make it wide enough to extend off the left edge or tall enough to extend up over the top edge.

Edited November 22, 201114 yr by LaRetta

Great. But how do I actually detect that there are no records? I could use a global count field and determine my conditional formatting on whether or not that number is zero for the number of records present in the portal, but is there an easier way?

The calculation not IsEmpty() that I gave you above tests for related records right within the conditional format. :^)

WHOOPS! It's early!