setting characters on a report

[eaglejohn]

I am trying to set the less than or equal to synbol on a report. I can set it like <= but my users want the < sign above a single line _. In Micrososft word you can insert a symbol to get this. Does anyone have any idea how to do this in crystal?

Thanks, John

 

[GJParker]

You can use the character map on your PC to copy the character and paste it into a text object.

Arial font Unicode character 2264

HTH

Gary Parker
MIS Data Analyst
Manchester, England

 

[mrudolph]

Which version of Crystal are you using? Depending on the Font, the special character of the less than or equal too sign where it is stacked, may be in the extended Unicode part of the character set and Crystal 8.5 is not Unicode compliant, but version 9 and higher are Unicode compliant.

If you are using a version that is Unicode compliant, the following function in a formula will give you the less than or equal to sign that you are wanting using any of the normal fonts (Times New Roman, Tahoma, etc...):

ChrW(8804)


If you are using 8.5, using the following function in a formula using the Symbol font will give you what you are wanting:

Chr(163)

You can always use the Character Map found in the Windows/Accessories folder in the start menu to pick a font and scroll through looking for characters available. If needed you can use the Windows calculator to convert the Hex value that character map gives you to the ASCII decimal value you will need to use in your Crystal Formula for the ChrW(x) or Chr(x) functions.

Hope this helps.

 

[mrudolph]

Just as a follow up. If you aren't wanting to use a formula method to get those characters and just want them in a text box then you can do either of the following depending on your version of Crystal.

Crystal 8.5: In your text box copy the character from the character map for the Symbol font (happens to be hex value of A3 which is 163 in decimal, so you could get the character by holding down the ALT key and using your keypad and typing 0163 while in your text box)

Crystal 9.0 or higher: You can use the Symbol font like above, or if you want to use the same font as the rest of your text box(e.g. Arial, Times New Roman,etc...), then copy the character from the character map for the font you are using (keyboard method would be holding down the ALT key and entering 8804 inside your text box). 8804 is the decimal value of the Hexadecimal 2264 for that character from the Unicode.

 

[eaglejohn]

Thank you mrudolph and GJParker for all your help. I was able to get the less than 0or equal sign on the report. However, I am having another problem. I am concatenating this symbol with other fields and they are numeric and text fields. Is there a way to designate part of a formula to use on type of font while the rest of the formula uses another.? Something like the CRBOLD command.

eagleJohn

 

[mrudolph]

eagleJohn,

Unfortunately there is not an ability to format within the Formula Editor itself to tell different parts of the formula output to take on different Font formatting (e.g. Bold, Italics, Font Face, etc...).

What you can do is insert your numeric fields, string fields, and formula fields inside a text box with the actual text you have typed and then individually format each object or text character(s) inside the text box with the particular Font formatting you need.

 

[lbass]

Well, actually you can format individual parts of a formula with different fonts if you use HTML tags, and then right click on the formula->format field->paragraph formatting->text interpretation->HTML. Try:

"If sales are " + "<font face = symbol>"+chr(163)+"</font face>" +" then withhold the chocolate donuts!"

Usually you will also want to reduce the font size as well, since the HTML interpretation causes the font size to appear larger:

"<font size = 2>"+"If sales are " + "<font face = symbol>"+ chr(163)+"</font face>"+" then withhold the chocolate donuts!"+"</font size>"

-LB

 

[eaglejohn]

LBass,
Thankyou for your help. One more thing, it seems to make the formula left justified and i need it right justified. All the settings sre for right justified.

Again thanks in advance, John

 

[lbass]

I never noticed that before. I did a Google search and came up with the following which seems to work. It is designed for table details:

"<td align=right>"+"<font size = 2>"+"If sales are " + "<font face = symbol>"+ chr(163)+"</font face>"+" then withhold the chocolate donuts!"+"</font size>"+"</td align>"

-LB

 

[eaglejohn]

That did the trick.

Thanks, John