multiple page

[Gismo]

Hi All,
I am not that familiar with reports, dont use them that often.
I have inherited a 26 page word document used as a template.
There is about 250 fields to be updated in the document for 42 reports.
I have created a access DB to do everything automatically to replace the word document but now I need to write the 26 page report.
How do you create a report that spans over 26 pages?
do I put all 26 page data in the body of one report or do I create 26 reports or one report with 26 sub reports? every page must have a page number in the format of "# of #"
Please could you assist?

 

[isladogs]

That is far too vague a question for anyone to give a proper answer.
Reports have a maximum height of 200cm in DESIGN VIEW.
However, if you have a lot of records, reports can have many thousands of pages.
One of mine is over 55000 pages long...but never actually printed!

If your 26 pages are made up of lots of separate sections, create a subreport for each.
Work on each in turn.
When you have each working, combine to create the final report.

BTW did you mean 42 records?

 

[Gismo]

Hi isladogs,
Thank you for the reply. Yeh I was not quite sure how to explain my issue. basically I need to get the 26 page word template in to access. there is quite a lot of text and approximately 10 different tables in the document. I need to repeat this for 42 different client. and for those client there are 250 record which is data only which I managed to get access to manage from linked tables on the server. The file on the server has a few 100 thousand record, not all relevant to all customers and not to all products. So my query result seems to work perfect. I just need to get all the data in the format of the word document.

another question, as I mentioned, there is quite a few written text in the word document. would you suggest to copy from word in to a form or directly into the report, per section as you mentioned, or maybe just skip the form, just paste directly into a table and do the formatting in the report?

I searched a few access videos but still not sure which approach to take on for this one.

Is there a easy way to copy from word in to a report? the quality and the format seems to differ when you copy and paste.
or the other way I was thinking, to copy and paste into a table per section then let the sub report manage the data?

 

[isladogs]

If I understand you correctly, this approach doesn't sound very practical.
You can copy and paste sections of text from Word to Access but you will have to reformat afterwards as you've found out.
From what you are saying it sounds like you may well hit the maximum report height of 200cm if you try this....though subreports may solve that.

Will you need to save the report?
You can't export a report as a Word doc.
Whilst you can export as RTF, the results are usually dreadful.
Much better to export to PDF if that's any use

I suggest a different approach.
Create a mail merge Word document containing your Access data
There are several ways of doing this.
You can do it all from Word and import the data required
Or handle everything from Access using the free super easy mail merge utility by Albert Kallal. Its old but still very widely used. The code is horribly complex but using it is 'SUPER EASY' as it says.

Or if your Word doc is essentially a fillable form populated with Access data, you can use bookmarks to place your data in Word. I've not done it for years so can't advise on this approach.

If you have A2010 or 2013, there is another possibility if its a fillable form. You could trying using the Office app InfoPath intended for that purpose. Unfortunately it was dropped from Office 2016/365

Hope at least one of these methods help.
Whichever you use its likely to be a long job to setup.

Good luck

 

[Gismo]

I decided to retype the complete word document in to separate sub reports. I is taking forever but I thing on the long run, it will display better, function better if I need to make changes later on. So for it seems to look quite neat. so I thank you for your super advice. I not that familiar with reports but seem to be going well.
just a quick question, then adding multiple sub reports, do you need to format your sub report to maximum page size or if the sub reports has a small entry, can the detail area bet the size of the text on that page. why I am asking, if there is just a few entries on the one page, will the next sub report fill the space on the same page?
also, why will a sub report start further down the page instead of on the top? when opening the sub report by itself, it looks fine, but on the main report it does not fit the page or starts further down the page.

 

[Gismo]

As per my previous question, the first attachment shows the data starts further down the page and continues on the next page, which should fit on one page.
on the second attachment, you can see the data goes over to the next page.
also on the second attachment, I have 2 sub sub reports on the same sub report but it seems to be duplicating and does that for about 10 pages, the 2 side by side sub sub reports only have approximately 14 rows each.

 

[isladogs]

You may need to move your sub reports into the report header instead of the detail. If that doesn't fix the duplication, post the design view of the report and tell us what links there are between the report and subreports

Another common solution is to just make the main report unbound and just use it as a 'holding container' for all the other reports.

 

[Gismo]

Hi,

I managed to get rid of the duplication.

Please could you advise why my report looks fine when I open it by itself, but then I open it as a sub report, the data does not start on the top of the page?

 

[isladogs]

Design view would be helpful!

 

[Gismo]

First is the Report
Second is the sub report in the main report

 

[isladogs]

You have 2 subreports in the main report.
The space is caused by the hidden top subreport. What does that contain?
If its not being shown, why is it there?
If it is needed, set Can Shrink property to Yes

 

[Gismo]

Yes I have 2 other sub reports above the one in question. both are full one page reports.
#rd page is also just one page report but does not start at the top and goes over to next page.
All subforms are set to can shrink yes
The first 2 sub reports are basically text field which I have created.
The 3rd sub report is linked to a table which will draw 39 records


First 2 Sub Reports are not hidden, only minimized to add the remaining other sub reports.

When I move the 3rd sub report to the second position, it works fine, any idea why?

 

[isladogs]

Not without looking at it. Having said that, I probably won't have time today if you did upload it ....but someone else will be able to advise