Focal Point
Examples on how to handle no records to report

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January 22, 2004, 07:02 PM
webfocuspgm
Examples on how to handle no records to report
I'm interested in learning new ways to inform customers that the report request did not generate any lines of information.

I'd appreciate any ideas you're willing to share......... Thanks in advance .......
January 22, 2004, 07:46 PM
susannah
Here's how i do it: 3 WAYS
WAY1:
TABLE FILE CAR
...do stuff
ON TABLE HOLD AS HSTUFF FORMAT HTMTABLE
END
-RUN
-IF &LINES GT 0 GOTO REPGEN;
...now here type your code to show a screen that
...says Sorry no stuff.
-GOTO EOJ;
-REPGEN
... now here type your regular html to dump out
.... your HSTUFF to the screen.
-EOJ
...
WAY2Red Facef course you can also SET EMPTYREPORT = ON
and then the HEADING of your ordinary report
will show up but no data will show up.
so your smart users will figure out 'oh, must not be anything for my set of selections'
and your needy user will complain that your system isn't working.
WAY3:
set an &variable , &HEADING
and set it to, maybe,a bunch of blanks to start
-SET &HEADING = 'some default heading' ;
SET EMPTYREPORT = ON
TABLE FILE CAR
...do stuff...
ON TABLE HOLD
END
-RUN
-SET &HEADING = IF &LINES GT 0 THEN &HEADING
- ELSE &HEADING | 'no stuff came out';
TABLE FILE HOLD
HEADING
"&HEADLINE"
" whatever your regular heading is "
...now make your report pretty
END
.....and now your empty output page will have
a line in the heading that is empty if you have data and says 'no stuff' if you have no data,
but the EMPTYREPORT setting will ensure that your user gets the heading they expect.
Thats all i know.