About 13-5 Form/Report Page Design

Every report, document, or letter that you generate uses a form design. A form design is a template for the layout of a page or pages. With 13-5 Form/Report Page Design, you can edit any of the form designs supplied with Sage 100 Contractor, or create entirely new forms. You can change the graphic elements and layout of the form, as well as the boilerplate text. This is especially useful when a company has several different businesses, and needs to use different forms for each business.

Before creating a report, it is important to understand how 13-3 Report Writer and Form/Report Page Design work together.

• In 13-5 Form/Report Page Design, you create the page layout for a single page form or a multi-page form that includes text, fields, and calculated fields. Form designs also use a detail box, which indicates where the details of the report will be placed.
• In 13-3 Report Writer, you create the body of the report that appears in the detail box of the form design. In the design of the report details, you can include text, fields, and calculated fields. In addition, you can control when a report prints on a new page or on an entirely new form.

13-5 Form/Report Page Design provides the ability to create multi-page forms. Suppose that you always send a cover letter with each proposal to potential clients. You can incorporate both the cover letter and the proposal forms in a single design. Then when you print proposals, the cover letter always prints with the proposal. A form can have up to 100 pages, each of which you can format differently.

• Creating new forms
• Creating new forms using existing forms
• Editing existing forms
• Previewing forms

Creating new forms

Note: Be aware that sometimes it is quicker to create a new form from an existing form if you only have to make a few changes or additions.

To create a new form, open 13-5 Form Report/Page Design. The 13-5 Form Report/Page Design window appears and displays a blank page on which you can begin creating your new form.

Creating new forms using existing forms

It may be easier for you to use an existing form to create a new form. For example, in the 3-2 Report Printing window, on the Report Criteria tab, you see a list of reports. When you click a report in the Report Criteria list, the form upon which the report is based is displayed in the Report Form drop-down list.

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The system forms follow a specific naming pattern, for example, System.Invoice_AR. For the new report to appear in Sage 100 Contractor in the area in which you would want it to appear, it must be saved with a similar naming scheme. For example, YourName.Invoice_AR. You do not need to preserve “System” in the name, you must retain the .Invoice_AR in the name. The "System" designation is intended to identify the forms that are included with the program installation. Forms that you create or modify should not include "System" in the name.

Note: Form designs are listed alphabetically in the report form list. To see your new forms listed before the "System" reports, use a name that will appear before the word system.

When you open a system report and save it with a new name, it is saved by default to the \Report Forms folder; however, you can choose to save it in a different folder. If you save it to a different folder, it will not appear in the program.

Editing existing forms

Previewing forms

To preview a form within 13-5 Form/Report Page Design:

To preview a form from within a Report Printing window:

Reducing the document size when previewing forms

When previewing a form, you can reduce the size of a document displayed in the Screen Review window.