I am currently working on a compound report that will contain several reports. The first few are just simple one-report-per-page cases, but after those I need to add a coordinated report: the first BY field will be used to paginate the report across several pages.

In the compound layout definition my eye caught the "SECTION=section1" line, which looks like it will determine whether reports therein are coordinated or not. It looks like I'll need to create a compound report with multiple SECTIONs for what I want, where the first SECTION contains normal reports and the second SECTION contains the coordinated report. Is that about right?

I have been experimenting a bit with adding a second SECTION to the "initialization" part of the compound, but when I do that the first "SET COMPONENT"-statement results in a "COMPONENT out of order" error. Apparently that's not the correct way - what is?

Currently my result (with -SET &ECHO = ON) looks like:

 SET ERROROUT = ON
 SET DMPRECISION = 2
 SET HTMLARCHIVE=ON
 COMPOUND LAYOUT PCHOLD FORMAT PDF
 UNITS=CM, $
 SECTION='section1',
 LAYOUT=ON, METADATA='0.5^0.5^0.5^0.5^1',
 MERGE=OFF ,
 ORIENTATION=LANDSCAPE , PAGESIZE=A4 ,
 $
 PAGELAYOUT=ALL, NAME='Page Master',$
 OBJECT=IMAGE, NAME='ApolloLogo',
 IMAGE=apollo_1200dpi.jpg,
 POSITION=(0.50 0.50), DIMENSION=(4.00 1.40),
 METADATA='Z-INDEX: 107; POSITION: absolute; WIDTH: 4.00cm; HEIGHT: 1.40cm; TOP: 0.50cm; LEFT: 0.50cm',
 $
 OBJECT=STRING, NAME='HeadingText',
 TEXT='<font face="ARIAL" size=14><center>Compound automation tests</center></font>',
 POSITION=(4.10 0.70), DIMENSION=(20.5 1.00),
 MARKUP=ON, WRAP=ON,
 style=bold, METADATA='',
 $
 OBJECT=IMAGE, NAME='VRLogo',
 IMAGE=vredestein_1200dpi.jpg,
 POSITION=(24.7 0.50), DIMENSION=(4.00 1.50),
 METADATA='Z-INDEX: 105; POSITION: absolute; WIDTH: 4.00cm; HEIGHT: 1.50cm; TOP: 0.42cm; LEFT: 24.7cm',
 $
 OBJECT=STRING, NAME='page-number',
 TEXT='<font face="ARIAL" size=8><right><ibi-page-number/></right></font>',
 POSITION=(28.2 20.5), DIMENSION=(1 0.5),
 MARKUP=ON, WRAP=OFF,
 METADATA='FONT-FAMILY: ARIAL; FONT_SIZE: 8pt; POSITION: ABSOLUTE; TOP: 20.5cm; LEFT: 28.2cm; WIDTH: 1cm; HEIGHT: 0.5cm; Z-INDEX: 107;',
 $
 COMPONENT='MFooter-s1',
 POSITION=(1 17.5),
 DIMENSION=(28.7 3),
 $
 PAGELAYOUT=1, NAME='Page layout 1',
 text='Test report nr. 1',
 TOC-LEVEL=1,
 BOTTOMMARGIN=0.5, TOPMARGIN=2.5,
 METADATA='BOTTOMMARGIN=0.5,TOPMARGIN=2.5,LEFTMARGIN=0,RIGHTMARGIN=0,',
 $
 COMPONENT='Report1', POSITION=(1 1.5), DIMENSION=(27.7 16.5),$
 COMPONENT='Footer1',
 POSITION=(1 17),
 DIMENSION=(28.7 3),
 $
 PAGELAYOUT=2, NAME='Page layout 2',
 text='Test report nr. 2',
 TOC-LEVEL=1,
 BOTTOMMARGIN=0.5, TOPMARGIN=2.5,
 METADATA='BOTTOMMARGIN=0.5,TOPMARGIN=2.5,LEFTMARGIN=0,RIGHTMARGIN=0,',
 $
 COMPONENT='Report2', POSITION=(1 1.5), DIMENSION=(27.7 16.5),$
 COMPONENT='Footer2',
 POSITION=(1 17),
 DIMENSION=(28.7 3),
 $
 PAGELAYOUT=3, NAME='Page layout 3',
 text='Test report nr. 3',
 TOC-LEVEL=1,
 BOTTOMMARGIN=0.5, TOPMARGIN=2.5,
 METADATA='BOTTOMMARGIN=0.5,TOPMARGIN=2.5,LEFTMARGIN=0,RIGHTMARGIN=0,',
 $
 COMPONENT='Report3', POSITION=(1 1.5), DIMENSION=(27.7 16.5),$
 COMPONENT='Footer3',
 POSITION=(1 17),
 DIMENSION=(28.7 3),
 $
 SECTION='section2',
 LAYOUT=ON, METADATA='0.5^0.5^0.5^0.5^1',
 MERGE=OFF,
 ORIENTATION=LANDSCAPE, PAGESIZE=A4,
 $
 PAGELAYOUT=ALL, NAME='Page Master',$
 OBJECT=IMAGE, NAME='ApolloLogo',
 IMAGE=apollo_1200dpi.jpg,
 POSITION=(0.50 0.50), DIMENSION=(4.00 1.40),
 METADATA='Z-INDEX: 107; POSITION: absolute; WIDTH: 4.00cm; HEIGHT: 1.40cm; TOP: 0.50cm; LEFT: 0.50cm',
 $
 OBJECT=STRING, NAME='HeadingText',
 TEXT='<font face="ARIAL" size=14><center>Compound automation tests</center></font>',
 POSITION=(4.10 0.70), DIMENSION=(20.5 1.00),
 MARKUP=ON, WRAP=ON,
 style=bold, METADATA='',
 $
 OBJECT=IMAGE, NAME='VRLogo',
 IMAGE=vredestein_1200dpi.jpg,
 POSITION=(24.7 0.50), DIMENSION=(4.00 1.50),
 METADATA='Z-INDEX: 105; POSITION: absolute; WIDTH: 4.00cm; HEIGHT: 1.50cm; TOP: 0.42cm; LEFT: 24.7cm',
 $
 OBJECT=STRING, NAME='page-number',
 TEXT='<font face="ARIAL" size=8><right><ibi-page-number/></right></font>',
 POSITION=(28.2 20.5), DIMENSION=(1 0.5),
 MARKUP=ON, WRAP=OFF,
 METADATA='FONT-FAMILY: ARIAL; FONT_SIZE: 8pt; POSITION: ABSOLUTE; TOP: 20.5cm; LEFT: 28.2cm; WIDTH: 1cm; HEIGHT: 0.5cm; Z-INDEX: 107;',
 $
 COMPONENT='MFooter-s2',
 POSITION=(1 17.5),
 DIMENSION=(28.7 3),
 $
 PAGELAYOUT=1, NAME='Page layout 1_p1',
 text='Report 4',
 TOC-LEVEL=1,
 BOTTOMMARGIN=0.5, TOPMARGIN=2.5,
 METADATA='BOTTOMMARGIN=0.5,TOPMARGIN=2.5,LEFTMARGIN=0,RIGHTMARGIN=0,',
 $
 COMPONENT='Report1_p1', POSITION=(1 1.5), DIMENSION=(27.7 16.5),$
 COMPONENT='Footer1_p1',
 POSITION=(1 17),
 DIMENSION=(28.7 3),
 $
 END
 SET COMPONENT='MFooter-s1'
 TABLE FILE SYSCOLUM
 " "
 SUM TBNAME NOPRINT
 IF READLIMIT EQ 1
 ON TABLE SET PREVIEW ON
 ON TABLE SET PAGE-NUM NOLEAD
 ON TABLE PCHOLD FORMAT PDF
 ON TABLE SET STYLE *
 ENDSTYLE
 END
 (FOC3303) Compound report COMPONENT out of order
 Exiting due to Exit on Error...
 (FOC3296) Error found in Coordinated Compound Report: At Component MFooter-s1
 Compound Report is TERMINATING.....

I asked IBI the same question a while ago, and the answer was that it only supports one section.

Not sure if this has changed since then or if its going to be in WF 8

If you build the separate reports individually, you can use something like PDFBOX to concat the PDF's together.

Oh, that's a shame. The whole way they set up this compound stuff strongly suggests there could be multiple sections... Thanks for the info.

I'll have to look for a workaround again, then.