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Quick report 3.0x quirk - hidden fields

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ukusa

Programmer
Oct 8, 2001
49
AU
Had a problem where a full blown stats report covered several pages. Using many sub-detail sections to present the different pages (not composite), you can easily cause a nasty if you try to export the report using the Text-filter. When designing and copying down fields from the report itself (not going to create each and everyone one of them!) and change the table field parameters for them, be careful if you thought you pasted fields and can't find them. If copying from one Sub-detail section and pasting them to another and repeating the paste, some position is decided on by Delphi and it could be hidden way down the next section. I ended up with two sets of fields in one location (on top of each other).

Previewing the report didn't show those hidden fields and there was not a shred of evidence to tell that such a thing had happened - it previewed Ok and it printed OK. I ended up checking the report over for fields that may have overlayed on another but nothing. But when I expanded the sub-detail bands to an extreme value (height), I saw the extra fields there. After deletion the report worked like before but can now be successfully exported to a text file.

The only error to tell something was wrong, was getting an "Invalid pointer" /" Access Violation in..." when exporting the report to text - strangely html and CSV exporting posed no problem. When you closed the report, it couldn't fire up again until you "destroyed" the report. This stumped me for a day or two until I decided to "pull apart" the report bit by bit to find out the problem.

You would think that whatever extra fields are there and are hidden, they would still be printed etc so you could tell a design problem was at hand.
 
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