I am in the process of creating a multimedia inventory in FMP 5.5. One of
the output options I am trying to achieve having my audio inventory printed
on paper sort by artist and each time it proceeds to change the first letter
of the artist name it will start on a new page. All of the artists'
beginning with A will be listed on a page, break then B and so on.

I am a novice when it comes to these things in FMP. I have a field called
First Letter and have tried several scenarios and can get close to what I
want but no 100%. The closest I have got is it will list them in ABC order
but then when the artist changes it starts a new page.


This is the output I am looking for

A
Aerosmith
Air Supply

page break

B
Bad Company
Bon Jovi - 7800 Fahrenheit
Bon Jovi - Slippery When Wet

page break

C
Charlie Daniels Band

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

Carl

In article <PVM5h.4154$Sw1.1624 (AT) newssvr13 (DOT) news.prodigy.com>, "Iced Tea"
<icedteas (AT) swbell (DOT) net> wrote:

There's two slight problems here:

Firstly all of the "A" artists may not fit on one page, so of course
there will be an extra page break in the middle of the A's - that
"middle" might well mean there's only one listed on the second page (or
even none listed on the second page resulting in a blank page). There's
nothing you can realistically do about this though.

Secondly, your example appears to be sorted by the Artist's Name, which
means "Charlie Daniels Band" is under C, when maybe it should really be
under D for Daniels ... that's really up to you where you want such
names to appear.


Anyway, you've already got the first letter, so the next step is to
create the layout in the correct way. What you'll need is something
like:

Header {if wanted}
-----------------------

[First Letter]

Sub-summary by First Letter (Leading)
-----------------------

[Artist Name] - [Audio Title]

Body
-----------------------


Sub-summary by First Letter (Trailing)
{Page Break after every 1 occurences}
-----------------------


Footer {if wanted}
-----------------------


There's no actual fields in the Trailing Sub-summary (which you can
make as small as sensible, ie. a couple of pixels high), but after
printing it for each First Letter you will get a page break.

Find the records you want to have in the report, sort them by:

First Letter
Artist Name
Audio Title

and then Preview or print the layout.



Helpful Harry
Hopefully helping harassed humans happily handle handiwork hardships ;o)

I was real close in trying to achieve my output, plus when I pulled the
LEFT(First Letter) I forgot to have the output return as text.

Thanks for you help!!!

Carl

"Helpful Harry" <helpful_harry (AT) nom (DOT) de.plume.com> wrote