I suspect this is a pretty standard problem, but I wasn't able to find
information about it on the boards or FileMaker's site. I've got a
layout for printing a single text field that extends across multiple
pages. When it crosses from one page to another in Preview, the
document loses part of a line or even a whole line. The layout is
just one part -- Body -- and just one field -- Contract. Sliding is
not turned on and there are no other objects on the layout.

I gather from FM's help file that the program isn't able to detect
when text is crossing a page boundary and so can't do anything about
formatting multi-page fields, but perhaps someone has a workaround?
I'm on Mac OSX with FM10 Adv. Any help much appreciated.

Best,
-J

On 2009-10-26 11:31:42 -0700, jahn <jahnbigbooty (AT) yahoo (DOT) com> said:

This has been a problem for many versions. Even through complete
changes in how FM addresses printer drivers. :/ HP printers are
notoriously the worst.

Best fix when you don't have the option of splitting text into smaller
chunks is to pick a specific line spacing by pixels (such as 14) for
the text block that fits properly onto the page. This reduces the
number of times FM has to choose where to put a line at the bottom of
the page.

Try also using a merge field. Sometimes, depending on printer or font
used, this works better.

Of course, remember that FM is not a page layout or text editing
program. It's never going to be as good as one of those. Where
precision or complex formatting is necessary, it's generally better to
export to Word or other app. There are ways to use XML and XSLT style
sheets to do this elegantly.
--
Lynn Allen
--
www.semiotics.com
Member FBA
FM 10 Certified Developer

Dang, that's too bad. I've always heard the line about FM not being a
word processor, but then I've always found that it handles complex,
multi-table, subsubsubsummarized datasets really well. I guess I've
never had a huge chunk of text I had to set down in the middle of the
page and extend for miles. I'll give your line spacing idea a shot
and see how it works. Thanks for the quick advice.

Best,
-J.