How To Control Line Feeds

Commands to control line feeds are helpful when formatting complex reports. Normally, after each line is read from the report definition, the report system makes the printer go to a new line. You may be printing complex information, or the system may need to scan a list before printing a certain variable. In these cases, the @no line feed command can be used to control what is output.

No Line Feed

@no line feed (This command is case sensitive.)

Turns OFF Line Feeds after each report line. The lines of code that follow this command will all appear on the same line in your report until the @line feed command is reached.

Line Feed

@line feed (This command is case sensitive.)

Turns ON Line Feeds after the previous report lines. There must be a BLANK LINE after the @line feed command for it to work.

Please remember to re-enable line feeds with @line feed and a blank line whenever you have used @no line feed to turn them OFF in your report.

Line Feed Example

You may want to create a report with many columns that prints landscape but if you type any line in the report writer that extends past 132 characters, when you save the report body, everything past the 132nd character will be deleted.

There is a way around this:

Use the @no line feed and @line feed features of the report writer.

For example:

@no line feed (This command is case sensitive.)
@de.na<
@de.co<
@de.fi<
@de.ow<
@line feed (This command is case sensitive.)

then, carry on with the rest of your report. Whatever the Report Writer finds between the @no line feed and the @line feed command will be printed on the same line when the report is printed.

Be sure to include the EMPTY BLANK LINE below the @line feed command for it to take effect.

When you start the @no line feed, the next line down can be the first data field or text. Notice the next line has a space in front of the field. This is to allow one space to be printed after the line above it.

Have a look at the Monthly Spindown report in the Demodb database. It shows two methods of using the No Line Feed feature. In one method, a sentence is broken in half and in the other, as in the example above, individual fields are placed on separate lines.