Available Format Options

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Report format options describe where and how each report item is to be displayed and printed. Format options define the appearance of the report, its contents, and the position and appearance of its data, headings, and footings. Each data item in the report can be followed by any meaningful group of format options (See Conventions). Each group of format options begins and ends with a colon. Within the colons, each format options is separated from the next by at least one space.

Some format options are designed for text reports while other for graphical reports, sometimes both.

The following is the Report Format Options description for graphical reports, where “n” can be any positive integer:

ITEM	Description
FIELD ‘template field’	Associates this report item to a template field and inherits all existing formats in this template field like font, size, color, etc.
NEWPAGE [n]	Before displaying this item, skip to the nth page following the current page. The default value for n is 1.
LINE n	Before displaying this item, skip to line n on the current page. N must be greater than the current line number. LINE cannot be used in conjunction with NEWLINE.
CENTER	Center this report item within the current PAGEWIDTH. The default for PAGEWIDTH is 80 characters.
NOPRINT	Suppress the display of the associated report item. For example, if you want to initialize some variables for use later in the report, you can use a command such as REPORT HEADING 9let TotSal=0) :noprint: to set the value of the variable TotSal without actually printing the value in the report.
WRAP	Wrap this report item onto one or more lines, in a column WIDTH positions wide. An attempt is made to split the line item at a logical point (e.g.: a blank, hyphen, slash, comma). WRAP is useful for printing long fields of text.
SPAN	Wrap this report item onto one or more lines, in a column WIDTH positions wide (similar to WRAP). Unlike WRAP, SPAN does not attempt to break the report item at logical points.
SUPPRESS	Suppress printing of this report item if its value has not changed since the last time it was displayed.
UNDERLINE	Underline this report item.
MASK ‘mask’	Provides a pattern, or ‘mask’, that precisely defines how data is to be displayed. The output result depends both on the mask string and on the data value. Character, number and date masking rules differ (See How to Use Data Masks).

The following is the Report Format Options description for text reports, where “n” can be any positive integer:

ITEM	Description
NEWPAGE [n]	Before displaying this item, skip to the nth page following the current page. The default value for n is 1.
NEWLINE [n]	Before displaying this item, skip n lines. The default for n is 1. NEWLINE cannot be used in conjunction with LINE or OLDLINE.
LINE n	Before displaying this item, skip to line n on the current page. N must be greater than the current line number. LINE cannot be used in conjunction with NEWLINE or OLDLINE.
OLDLINE	Overstrike the current line. OLDLINE cannot be used in conjunction with NEWLINE or LINE.
CENTER	Center this report item within the current PAGEWIDTH. The default for PAGEWIDTH is 80 characters.
COLUMN n	Print this report item in column n of the line. COLUMN cannot be used in conjunction with SPACES.
SPACES n	Before displaying this item, move n spaces to the right from the current position in the line (n can be zero). SPACES cannot be used in conjunction with COLUMN.
NOPRINT	Suppress the display of the associated report item. For example, if you want to initialize some variables for use later in the report, you can use a command such as REPORT HEADING 9let TotSal=0) :noprint: to set the value of the variable TotSal without actually printing the value in the report.
WIDTH n	Change the column width of this report item to n characters. The width of a report item is normally determined from the defined width of the item or the item’s heading. WIDTH lets you shrink or expand the item’s width. If n is less than the defined width of the report item, the data value is truncated, unless you also use WRAP or SPAN.
WRAP	Wrap this report item onto one or more lines, in a column WIDTH positions wide. An attempt is made to split the line item at a logical point (e.g.: a blank, hyphen, slash, comma). WRAP is useful for printing long fields of text.
SPAN	Wrap this report item onto one or more lines, in a column WIDTH positions wide (similar to WRAP). Unlike WRAP, SPAN does not attempt to break the report item at logical points.
SUPPRESS	Suppress printing of this report item if its value has not changed since the last time it was displayed.
UNDERLINE	Underline this report item.
HEADING ‘text’	Supplies a heading for the associated report item. If HEADING is not specified, the field headings are used when displaying fields from entity sets, relationships, documents, and forms; variable names when displaying variables; and spaces in all other cases. You can turn all headings off by specifying COLUMN HEADING OFF in a DETAIL LINE command.
MASK ‘mask’	Provides a pattern, or ‘mask’, that precisely defines how data is to be displayed. The output result depends both on the mask string and on the data value. Character, number and date masking rules differ (See How to Use Data Masks).

Format options can be used in any report command except REPORT FROM and ENDREPORT.

Using Report Format Options

General points to remember when specifying format options for a report item are the following:

The first report item in a command always begins on a new line (i.e.: NEWLINE 1 is automatic) in a line-oriented report. Also, this report item begins in column 1, unless otherwise specified.
All line and column positioning is processed before the report item itself is formatted.

19 June 2020

Updated11 June 2022

ByJason Lee

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Available Format Options