Report structure

A key feature of a report is that it is divided into sections and subsections. Using sections, you can get to the information you need and, using subsections, arrange it in a consistent format.

There are seven subsections in a report section. Five are standard subsections: Report Header, Page Header, Details, Page Footer, and Report Footer, in that order. Grouping is optional and applies a level of organization that aggregates by common fields. If grouping is used, the report section has two additional subsections for each group: Group Header and Group Footer. Each subsection is described in the following table:

SectionLocationDescription

Report Header Report Header

Appears at the beginning of the report section.

This subsection typically contains the report title. You can customize it to include additional report elements such as origination date or company logo.

By default, the Report Header is used as a cover page. This option makes the Report Header take up a full size page upon export. The option can be turned off under Report Header on the Format tab.

Page Header Page Header

Repeats at the top of every page, except the first page, where it appears under the Report Header.

Field headers are typically included in the Page Header so that every page starts with these definitions.

Group Header Group Header

Appears at the beginning of each new group of records.

The grouped field value appears in the Group Header. For example, in a report in which cities are grouped by county, the county field would be included in the Group Header.

Details Details

Follows all header information.

The attribute contents being displayed in the report. Fields listed here repeat once for every row in the source.

Group Footer Group Footer

Appears at the end of each group of records.

Summary statistics appear in this subsection by default.

Page Footer Page Footer

Repeats at the bottom of every page.

Page numbers appear in this subsection by default.

Report Footer Report Footer

Appears at the end of the report.

This subsection of the report usually contains conclusion information, such as summary information or data citations, that is only required once and appears at the end of a report section. Statistics appear in this subsection by default.

Note:

Subsections cannot be reorganized in the Contents pane.

When you create a report, the height of each subsection is automatically calculated based on the height of the elements it contains. An element can be either static (such as a title, subtitle, or column header) or dynamic (such as page number, images, lines, rectangles, and background colors). As with subsections, elements are automatically sized at report creation. Both subsections and elements can be resized and repositioned using the Select tool Select by Rectangle. Make sure that elements in a subsection are sized correctly; otherwise they may be truncated upon export.

To control the height of a subsection, you can type a new value for the height property in the Size group on the Format tab or manually expand it by reshaping the selected subsection directly in the report view with the Select tool Select by Rectangle active. The width is the same for all subsections and is determined by the page width you specify for the report. Subsections can also be hidden from view.

Note:

A subsection cannot be resized smaller than the lowest element within it. To reduce a subsection to a smaller size, you must either delete the elements inside it or move them to the top of the subsection.

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