Need for Reformatting Reports

The EMPLOYEES-MARKETING report is a personnel report listing employees and certain pertinent information about them. Beneath the title EMPLOYEES REPORT – FOR MARKETING DEPARTMENT are the column headers for the report fields (EMPLOYEE NO., EMPLOYEE NAME, and so on).

Not all fields in the EMPLOYEES-MARKETING report are immediately visible. The report is designed for printing on 132-column paper, and is over 100 characters wide. The screen display is usually 80 characters wide. To see the INSURANCE field, for example, it is necessary to press the RIGHT key (PF11/PF23).

This exercise illustrates how to find the insurance premium (in the INSURANCE field) for the employee named K. Wood and then reformat the report to find information on it easier.

1. Press the RIGHT key (PF11/PF23).

   The UNION DUES, INSURANCE, SICK DAYS, and VAC DAYS fields of the report are now displayed.

   Figure 20 Employees-Marketing Report Screen Shifted Right

   ------------- CONTROL-D/V REPORT VIEWING   NOTES    0   PAGE      1 OF        3

   COMMAND ===>                                                   SCROLL ===> CRSR

   USR DEMO     REP EMPLOYEES-MARKETING  JB JDEMO    04544 DT 050500 RUL

   ----+----1----+----2----+----3----+----4----+----5----+----6----+----7----+----8

   TMENT       DATE:  03/05/00

   UNION   INSURANCE  SICK  VAC

   DUES               DAYS  DAYS

   ------  ---------  ----  ----

   116.00     212.00   01    02

   150.00     068.00   01    07

   100.00     112.00   01    10

   156.00     114.00   01    06

   154.00     222.00   01    07

   157.00     222.00   01    07

   158.00     292.00   01    07

   153.00     219.00   01    07

   107.00     222.00   05    05

   075.00     200.00   01    00

   106.00     222.00   01    03

   123.00     120.00   01    07

   122.00     220.00   01    07

   120.00     220.00   01    07

   120.00     120.00   01    07

   CMDS: FIND str (PREV), EDIT, RULER on/off/name, VALUE, N n P n        16.46.19

2. Because the EMPLOYEE NAME field is not displayed while the INSURANCE field is displayed, for example, it is difficult to immediately identify which insurance premium belongs to K. Wood. As the report is currently formatted, you would have had to remember that K. Wood’s record was the seventh row down before shifting over to the right.
3. Press the LEFT key (PF10/PF22) to return to the first report screen.

   Because the EMPLOYEES-MARKETING report displays over an 80 column screen and you are looking for a field which is past the 80th line, it would be convenient if you could keep, for example, the EMPLOYEE NUMBER and EMPLOYEE NAME fields "frozen in place" while you shift the report left and right to find other fields.

   This can be done using Control-D rulers.

4. For the next example, press the DOWN key (PF08/PF20).

   Look at the value 10 in the record for S. Hawthorne.

   Figure 21 Employees-Marketing Report Screen (2)

   ------------- CONTROL-D/V REPORT VIEWING   NOTES    0   PAGE      1 OF        3

   COMMAND ===>                                                   SCROLL ===> CRSR

   USR DEMO     REP EMPLOYEES-MARKETING  JB JDEMO    04544 DT 050500 RUL

   ----+----1----+----2----+----3----+----4----+----5----+----6----+----7----+----8

     66115    N. TRACEY         08    23,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      1

     66116    D. KRAY           09    35,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      3

     66117    S. HAWTHORNE      10    37,500   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      1

     66118    T. WOODLAND       21    36,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      2

     66119    J. SCHOLTEN       07    28,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      2

     66120    D. GRADWELL       06    29,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      3

     66121    J. GOLDEN         05    32,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      4

     66122    H. UHRBACH        03    29,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      5

     66123    C. GANES          07    28,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      2

     66124    B. WAGNER         02    32,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      3

     66125    J. O'LEARY        18    33,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      1

     66126    D. HENRICH        02    70,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      5

     66127    S. LUGAR          28    42,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      4

     66128    A. BALTER         03    29,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      2

     66129    E. BIRCH          10    27,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      2

     66130    J. SUTTON         09    36,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      2

     66131    D. DAVENPORT      03    37,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      1

     66132    L. LEVY           01    41,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      2

     66133    J. BRENNAN        08    27,000   XXX-YY-ZZZZ      1

   CMDS: FIND str (PREV), EDIT, RULER on/off/name, VALUE, N n P n        11.41.08

It is not clear what the 10 represents, because the column headers have scrolled out of view.

The column headers have scrolled out of view because the report was developed to display column headers only at the top of each page. Since printed reports usually contain about 60 to 80 lines per page but screens usually display about 20 to 24 lines, column headers from one page scroll off the screen before the column headers from the next page are displayed.

The problem of scrolling headers also can be solved using Control-D rulers.