ActiveReports allows you to create Master Detail reports with grouping by using the GroupHeader and Detail sections to contain data from master files and detail files.

This walkthrough illustrates how to create a Master Detail report using grouping to organize the report.

This walkthrough is split up into the following activities:

• Adding an ActiveReport to a Visual Studio project
• Connecting the report to a data source
• Adding controls to the report to contain data
• Viewing the report 

To complete the walkthrough, you must have access to the Northwind database.
A copy is located at C:\Program Files\Data Dynamics\ActiveReports for .NET 3.0\Data\NWIND.MDB.

When you have completed this walkthrough, you will have a report that looks similar to the following.

Adding an ActiveReport to a Visual Studio project

To add an ActiveReport to your project

1. Open a new project in Visual Studio.
2. From the Project menu, select Add New Item.
3. Select ActiveReports 3.0 File and rename the file rptMD.
4. Click Open.

Connecting the report to a data source

To connect the report to a data source

1. Click on the gray report DataSource icon in the Detail section to open the report DataSource dialog box.
2. Select the "OLE DB" tab.
3. Click the Build button.
4. Select Microsoft Jet 4.0 OLE DB Provider and click Next.
5. Click the ellipsis button to browse for the access path to the Northwind database. Click Open once you have selected the appropriate access path.
6. Click OK to continue.
7. In the Query field, type "Select * from orders, [order details], products where orders.OrderID = [order details].OrderID and products.productID = [order details].productID order by OrderDate".
8. Click OK to return to the report design surface.

Adding controls to the report to contain data

To add controls to the report

1. Change the BackColor property of the page header to Silver.
2. Add labels to the page header with the following properties set:

   Name	Text	Font Style	Location
   lblOrderDate	Order Date	Bold	0, 0
   lblShipName	Ship Name	Bold	1, 0
   lblShippedDate	Shipped Date	Bold	3, 0
   lblShipAddress	Ship Address	Bold	4, 0
   lblShipCountry	Ship Country	Bold	5.5, 0

3. Add a GroupHeader/Footer section to rptMD by right-clicking the design surface of the report and selecting Insert > Group Header/Footer.
4. Make the following changes to the group header:
   • Change the Name property to ghOrders
   • Change the BackColor property to LightGray
   • Change the DataField property to orders.OrderID
5. In the Report Explorer, expand the Fields node, then the Bound node. Drag the following fields onto ghOrders and set the properties as indicated. 

   DataField	Name	Text	OutputFormat	Location
   OrderDate	txtOrderDate1	Order Date	MM/dd/yy	0, 0
   ShipName	txtShipName1	Ship Name		1, 0
   ShippedDate	txtShippedDate1	Shipped Date	MM/dd/yy	3, 0
   ShipAddress	txtShipAddress1	Ship Address		4, 0
   ShipCountry	txtShipCountry1	Ship Country		5.5, 0

6. Add another GroupHeader/Footer section to your report.
7. Change the BackColor property of the group header to LightSteelBlue.
8. Add labels to the group header with the following properties set:

   Name	Text	Font Style	Location
   lblOrderID	Order ID	Bold	0, 0
   lblProductName	Product Name	Bold	1, 0
   lblProductID	Product ID	Bold	3, 0
   lblUnitPrice	Unit Price	Bold	4, 0
   lblQuantity	Quantity	Bold	5.5, 0

9. Make the following changes to the detail section:
   • Change the BackColor property to AliceBlue
   • Change the CanShrink property to True
10. In the Report Explorer, expand the Fields node, then the Bound node. Drag the following fields onto the detail section and set the properties as indicated.  

    DataField	Name	Text	Miscellaneous	Location
    orders.OrderID	txtOrderID1	Order ID		0, 0
    ProductName	txtProductName1	Product Name		1, 0
    products.ProductID	txtProductID1	Product ID		3, 0
    products.UnitPrice	txtUnitPrice1	Unit Price	OutputFormat = Currency	4, 0
    Quantity	txtQuantity1	Quantity		5.5, 0

Viewing the report

To view the report

1. Add the ActiveReports viewer control to a Windows Form.
2. Add the code needed to set the viewer document equal to the report document. See Using the ActiveReports Windows Form Viewer for help.

See Also

 

 

---

Copyright © 2004-2007 Data Dynamics, Ltd. All rights reserved.