I have a 7 page standardized gov't document I will need to print out
as hardcopy in the future. I am wondering what method you used in the
past that was successful. Did you create a scanned image of it, use
the image as the background of the report, and overlay the controls
over the background? Or did you position position the controls on a
blank report and first print a bunch of copies of the form, use that
as the paper source, and then print the document? Perhaps use Word as
the output source? Any suggestions or alternatives?

"Patrick Finucane" <patrickfinucanetx (AT) gmail (DOT) com> wrote

Patrick, I've used each of the methods you describe, but not with a 7-page
original document... all of mine were within the 22 inch report page length,
so I didn't have to jump through any hoops in that regard (but, on occasion,
have used Subreports to good advantage as a workaround).

Working with controls positioned atop a scanned image was very slow in
development, back when I did it, in the days of 33MHz 386 computers, Win
3.1, and Access 2.0, but it did work. That's the last time I used the
technique, but with faster computers and more responsive displays, it might
be less irritating to develop.

The best luck I've had was in cases where the user was not "picky" about the
exact size, and recreated the Form using Labels, Lines, and Rectangles,
either in the Report, or in Word. If the output is later to be scanned, it
will depend on the scanner and operator -- in one instance, I feared that
the "picky" folk who scanned the generated data would reject it, but it
turned out that their scanner allowed enough latitude that it was perfectly
satisfactory.

But I have, with a bit more effort in development, managed to place controls
so that the actual form (some government, some business) could be used as
the paper source. If you do this, the potential drawback can be that the
originator of the form expects it to be filled in by hand or the data to be
typed, and positioning of graphics and labels on their forms may vary from
print lot to print lot.

Larry Linson, Microsoft Office Access MVP

On 10/23/2011 11:56 AM, Access Developer wrote:
you can fill in the fields electronically on a "protected" word document
is to unprotect the document and use Access to Word capabilities to fill
in the fields and then print the word document.

More of a pain to set up the first time but produces the best formatted
document. good for very picky people.

I did a 25-30 page government document this way that had hundreds and
hundreds of fields. worked well but again was tedious to do.

HTH

bob