Creating a Report

There are two ways to create a report. You can create reports manually, step-by-step, or you can use one of ReportPro's powerful Report Wizards. This topic explains how to create a report manually since it provides a good way to learn ReportPro.

There are two basic steps you must perform to create a report:

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First you must define a data source. This process tells ReportPro where to get the information that will be included on the report. It also allows ReportPro to retrieve information about the data that is available from the data source. This information is used to provide sample data as you create the report.

•	The second step is to place report objects in the bands of the work window. Report objects are what generate the printed output.

Of course this is a very simplistic view of how to create a report. In practice you will want to specify filters, sort orders, and customize the report objects to present your data in a professional and meaningful manner. For more complex reports, you will likely define sections or specify complex relations between tables in your data source.

You create a report by choosing File, New from ReportPro's main menu. When you select this menu option, a sub menu will appear that allows you to select the type of report you wish to create or which Report Wizard you wish to use. The first three menu options represent the basic types of reports supported by ReportPro.

The Standard report is the most common and covers reports that are not columnar in nature and do not generate a Cross-Tab output. Though this may sound complicated, it really is not. If you are creating a listing, or form based report, you are creating a Standard report.

Label reports are columnar in nature. Mailing address labels are a good example of this type of report. You can also use Label reports to create a listing style report that has multiple columns.

Cross-Tab reports are those that perform a summary operation on a database and report the result set in a grid type format.

Also See:

Creating a Standard Report

Creating a Label Report

Creating a Cross-Tab Report