[responses inline]
Note that the responses to your questions are general in nature - if you
have additional questions then I recommend posting each one as a separate
post in an Access newsgroup that is specific to your question. Such as use
the Forms group for form questions, Reports group for report questions, etc.
Also, if you like Access then I also recommend getting a good book - the
answers to some of your questions (which are very good questions, btw) need
about a chapter or more of detail to answer them in-depth. ;-)
please, allow me to add a new question to the list of doubts regarding
the use of Access reports: is it possible to represent the retrieved
records in the form of a table (cells with borders)? (And without
separations between records, that is, all the records in the same
table).
Yes, but it's a little difficult to make it appear seamless - you need to
use borders on each of the text boxes, remove all of the space between them,
and remove the space above and below.
-I see that I can generate a simple report such as: "list of CDs". I
see that I can generate also a simple report such as: "list of
movies". But... can I put both reports one after another: that is,
"List of CDs" <here comes the list of CDs>, and then "List of movies"
<here comes the list of movies>. Probably, it would be ideal if I can
define a report for each type separately and then a report that
combines both of them. It seems that I can take outputs from a report
as the input for a new report, but I need something different: I don't
want a report with fields from two previous reports (I don't want to
mix info about CDs and about movies), but a report with the data of
two reports one after the other.
What you are looking for is called a Subreport. You can create an unbound
report and then add both reports as subreports (unlinked) so they print at
the same time.
-Is it possible to say that I want a new page after each type of data
in the document (e.g., after the list of CDs, please include a break
page)?
Since you mentioned "type" I suspect you are using a group? If so, then
either for the group header or group footer (this depends on your layout),
display the Properties for the section (double-click the section header) and
use the "Force New Page" property.
-Can I easily insert parts of a word document? This does not seem easy
from the "Design View" of the report. For example, I would like to be
able to insert a cover page as the first page (with a title, the date,
name of the author, and other personalized information). This cover
page will contain also a picture and a Word textbox. (If possible, I
would probably like to include automatically in the report several
initial pages from Word). I tried with "Insert->Object->Microsoft Word
document"
(by manual copy-paste and also by inserting from a file), but I don't
think this is the way to
do that... It seems I need to re-size manually the "inserted
object" (and I would like, of course,
the original size... and if it needs several pages, I would need this
object to span several pages).
And, if this is the way, should I insert the object in the "header"
window?
Adding content from other applications isn't that easy and it's not the best
method. If you want a cover page then make sure you have a Report header and
add the text boxes and images. Then use the "Force New Page" property for
the Report header and set it to "After Section". If you need it to span
several pages then use the Page Break tool in the Toolbox (View/Toolbox) and
place a Page Break between each portion of your data you want to view on
separate pages.
-Is it possible to indicate the behaviour that I want when a
"record" (the contents of the "Detail" window in the "Design view")
does not fit in the current page (e.g., either place the part that
fits and the rest on the next page or place the whole record in the
next page)?
Take a look at the Properties for the Detail section and see if the "Keep
Together" property is what you are looking for.
-Is it possible to include "horizontal lines" (as separators of
"records"). For example, in Word I can do this through the "Drawing"
toolbar. It seems that this toolbar is not available in Access...
Nevertheless, I think a horizontal line as separator should be
probably available somewhere in Access too.
Yes, there is a Line tool on the Toolbox you can use.
-Is it possible to group reports according to specific formats? For
example, I may have several formats for my data. A "format with
summarized info about CDs and movies", a "format with extended info
about CDs and movies", a "format including pictures of CDs and
movies", etc. Each "format" will be composed of similar "reports" but
with different formats each of them. My question is: is it possible to
classify the reports according to some criteria? For example, in order
to know that reports R1, R2 and R3 are used to compose format F1 and
R4, R5 and R6 are for format F2.
Sort of - you'd need to create a Switchboard or a Form that groups them.
-I want to repeat the "headings" for every record. The wizard puts the
headings only once, at the top. I've seen that I can modify this by
accessing later the "Design Window" and moving manually these headings
from the "page header" window to the "detail" window. Is it possible
to instruct the wizard to do this automatically?
No. The wizard is nice to use to get a starting point but few reports are
generated by using the Wizard only, well if you want them to display to your
liking, anyway. ;-)
Regarding the other solution ("Mail Merge" in Word), it seems it could
be a good choice too (and maybe easier?). However, I also find 3
problems:
-In the merge, each record is put on a separate page. Is it possible
to avoid this behavior? (Inserting only a break page, for example,
when a whole record does not fit on the current page).
I beleive you may have missed my note on using a Directory for your main
document.
-I can only select one table from the Access database. Is it possible
to use fields from several (unrelated) tables at the same time? Maybe
I can select fields from tables and define a query that
is the cartesian product of all the tables, but this would be
inefficient...
You need to investigate Relationships and Queries.
-Is there any workaround to the problem you mention about repeating
headings? (apart from the one
you say about including the headings after the merge has finished). Is
it possible to tell Word somehow that certain text should not be
repeated?
No, other than a VBA solution.
Please post all follow-up questions to the newsgroup. Requests for
assistance by email can not be acknowledged.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Beth Melton
Microsoft Office MVP
Co-author of Word 2007 Inside Out:
http://www.microsoft.com/MSPress/books/9801.aspx#AboutTheBook
Word FAQ:
http://mvps.org/word
TechTrax eZine:
http://mousetrax.com/techtrax/
MVP FAQ site:
http://mvps.org/