The designer tabs located at the bottom of the ActiveReports for .NET 3.0 design surface allow you to quickly access various aspects of ActiveReports. The ActiveReports designer is equipped with three tabs, the Designer tab, the Script tab, and the Preview tab.
- Designer Tab: By default, when you create or open an ActiveReport the designer tab is selected. While in this tab of the ActiveReport, you can perform all design-time and run-time functions associated with your report, such as creating a layout, binding to data sources, creating event-handling methods, and more.
- Script Tab: By selecting the Script tab, you open the script editor, which gives you the ability to easily and quickly add scripting to your report. The script editor contains two comboboxes that allow you to select any section of the ActiveReport and all events associated with that section. When you select a section and an event, the script editor generates a method stub for the event.
- Preview Tab: The Preview tab allows you to quickly view what your report looks like at run time without needing to actually run your project. This makes it easy to quickly see the run-time impact of changes you make in the designer or the code-behind. To gain a report preview, toggle from the Designer or Script tab to the Preview tab.
