LiveCode Forums

Hello,

I am searching for way by which I can design reports in LC (running in windows) and print using the designed reports in Mac OS X.

Is there any tutorial or blog article regarding this feature?

TIA

There's a chapter in the LiveCode Manual, and if you attend LiveCode Global, there just might be a session in May on it.

Hi.

Reports are usually generated by building a card or cards with a layout of controls of your choice. DataGrids, table fields and graphics are all available, in all colors.

I am working on a project now where the "report" is essentially a CAD-like drawing, printed to both pdf and paper. It looks pretty close to a drawing made in SolidWorks or AutoCad.

Was there something beyond those capabilities that you had in mind?

Craig Newman

dunbarx wrote: ↑

Thu Apr 05, 2018 5:22 pm

Hi.

Reports are usually generated by building a card or cards with a layout of controls of your choice. DataGrids, table fields and graphics are all available, in all colors.

I am working on a project now where the "report" is essentially a CAD-like drawing, printed to both pdf and paper. It looks pretty close to a drawing made in SolidWorks or AutoCad.

Was there something beyond those capabilities that you had in mind?

Craig Newman

Hello Craig,

Actually I don't know anything about printing in LC. I have a need to write a small billing software that should run on Mac OS X as well as Linux.

I have already developed the originally in Xojo but the printing quality from Xojo is now acceptable so I came searching for a cross platform tool that has robust reporting capabilities.

Are there any tutorials that contains step by step instructions as to how to develop reports and print them directly to printer or PDF?

TIA

Well, from what I remember of Rb, you 'printed' by literally creating graphics and drawing the pages. Not sure if that changed during the move to Xojo or not.

In Lc, you would create a report style card, with fields and whatnot, then print the card or cards. Some of the terms you'd want to look up would be print, pretty-print, etc.

Some previous conversations here that are worth looking at :
http://forums.livecode.com/viewtopic.php?t=11965
http://forums.livecode.com/viewtopic.php?t=24673

I don't know which version of Lc your using, but 7.x back had a stack called 'revreportsetup.rev' (mentioned in that last link, as well as elsewhere) which you can drop into your plugins folder and use to setup a report print out as well. I think most believe that just setting up a card the way you want the report to go is the best way though, and use 'print card'.

*Edit - this lesson goes into the basics pretty well.

I have a need to write a small billing software that should run on Mac OS X as well as Linux.

A form as you describe is basic and straightforward. Do you need a head start in creating a page that looks like an invoice or something similar? Can you place controls like fields graphics on a card?

Why not sketch a page and submit it here? This is easy stuff.

Craig

Hello,

Sorry for delay in reply.

Please find attached a sample output that I want to achieve in printing.
TIA

This is simple with a dataGrid, but that is not for new users.

But you can lay out fields on the card as you need, even table fields if you have experience with those, modify textStyles, and print either to paper or to pdf directly. Add a few graphic objects for pizzazz. Do you need advice on this?

I bet Richmond will send you an actual template in about an hour or so. He does that sort of thing.

But I really think you should get started laying out those fields. Oh, name them appropriately.

Craig