Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!know!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!mips!daver!ditka!mcdchg!tellab5!balr!segel
From: segel@balr.com (Michael Segel)
Newsgroups: comp.databases
Subject: Re: Informix Reporting ...
Message-ID: <1990Sep25.190213.1176@balr.com>
Date: 25 Sep 90 19:02:13 GMT
References: <1990Sep24.220517.6188@balr.com>
Reply-To: segel@balr.UUCP (Michael Segel)
Organization: Balr Corporation, Oak Brook, Il.
Lines: 34

In article <1990Sep24.220517.6188@balr.com> segel@balr.com (Michael Segel) writes:
>
>Well, this may seem like a strange problem, but I think
>that it may occur to other informix users, so maybe someone has a


Sorry 'bout that. What I wanted to ask was a work around
to doing reports in 4GL with indeterminate page lengths.
In 4GL, you must specify the page length for the printer, 
so Informix can do all the neat header/trailer and page handling.
However for my application I did not know the page size and lenght
(Can vary for each font, and I don't want to recompile my report
 and program each time.) 

My application was a simple PTS routine which would allow for
varible length fields for Problem and Solution comments in
the report. And I wanted the reports to line up correctly
no matter what font I was using.

So I printed the report to a file, and after I was done, I 
printed the file to the printer. To get a new page, I printed a
file with only a "^L" in it. (Informix will not allow for control
characters to be printed).

The only problem with this, is that Informix will automatically 
assume a page length (66 I think) and will force lines when it
thinks it is at the end of a page. 
	My solution to this was to set the PAGE LENGTH to some large
number like 9000, and to change the ESQL/C code generated to NOT
add blank lines. The change was to stop Informix from trying to
print 8000 or so Blank lines :-) This worked, however I seem 
to remember a simpler solution.
	Does anyone else have a simpler cure than fixing the 
ESQL/C code?