Inserting and defining a basic web control
The basic web controls can be inserted into the report areas listed in Component placement. This document shows how to insert and define values of the web controls separately.
Text field
To insert a text field and define its values:
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Do one of the following to insert the text field:
- Drag Text Field from the Toolbox panel to the destination.
- On the menu bar, click Insert > Web Controls > Text Field, then click the mouse button in the destination.
- On the Insert toolbar, click the down arrow on the Insert Control Objects button
and select Text Field from the drop-down list, then click the mouse button in the destination.
- Right-click the text field and select Display Type from the shortcut menu. The Display Type dialog will appear.
- In the Web Options panel of the Display Type dialog, select the type of the text field: Standard or Password.
Standard means that the text field will be a normal text field. Password means that the text field will be a password box in which the typed characters will be displayed as asterisks.
- Enter the name, value for the text field in the Name and Value fields.
- In the Tool Tip field, enter the tip you want to show for the text field. Then when the report runs in HTML format or in Page Report Studio, when you hover the mouse over the text field, the tooltip will be displayed.
- Set the character width in the Display Width field, and the maximum number of characters the user can enter in the Max Length field.
- Check the Read Only option if you would like to set this text field to be read-only.
- Check the Disabled checkbox if you want to make the text field disabled.
- Bind some web actions to the text field in the Web Behaviors box.
- Upon finishing, click the OK button to close this dialog.
Hidden field
A hidden field is visible only in design mode.
To insert a hidden field and define its values:
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Do one of the following to insert the hidden field:
- Drag Hidden Field from the Toolbox panel to the destination.
- On the menu bar, click Insert > Web Controls > Hidden Field, then click the mouse button in the destination.
- On the Insert toolbar, click the down arrow on the Insert Control Objects button and select Hidden Field from the drop-down list, then click the mouse button in the destination.
- Right-click the hidden field and select Display Type from the shortcut menu. The Display Type dialog will appear.
- In the Web Options panel of the Display Type dialog, specify the name and value of the hidden field.
- Bind some web actions to the hidden field in the Web Behaviors box.
- Upon finishing, click the OK button to close the dialog.
Text area
A text area allows you to input a multi-line string.
To insert a text area and define its values:
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Do one of the following to insert the text area:
- Drag Text Area from the Toolbox panel to the destination.
- On the menu bar, click Insert > Web Controls > Text Area , then click the mouse button in the destination.
- On the Insert toolbar, click the down arrow on the Insert Control Objects button and select Text Area from the drop-down list, then click the mouse button in the destination.
- Right-click the text area and select Display Type from the shortcut menu. The Display Type dialog will appear.
- In the Web Options panel of the Display Type dialog, enter the name, value of the text area in the Name and Value fields.
- In the Tool Tip field, enter the tip you want to show for the text area. Then when the report runs in HTML format or in Page Report Studio, when you hover the mouse over the text area, the tooltip will be displayed.
- Set the character width in the Display Width field.
- Specify the number of lines that the text area will allow in the Number of Lines field, and choose whether or not to wrap the text by selecting true or false from the Auto Wrap drop-down list.
- Check the Read Only option if you would like to set this text area to be read-only.
- Check the Disabled checkbox if you want to make the text area disabled.
- Bind some web actions to the text area in the Web Behaviors box.
- Upon finishing, click the OK button to close this dialog.
Checkbox/Radio button
The way to insert and define the values of a checkbox and radio button is the same.
To insert a checkbox/radio button and define its values:
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Do one of the following to insert the checkbox/radio button:
- Drag Checkbox/Radio Button from the Toolbox panel to the destination.
- On the menu bar, click Insert > Web Controls > Checkbox/Radio Button , then click the mouse button in the destination.
- On the Insert toolbar, click the down arrow on the Insert Control Objects button and select Checkbox/Radio Button from the drop-down list, then click the mouse button in the destination.
- Right-click the checkbox/radio button and select Display Type from the shortcut menu. The Display Type dialog will appear.
- In the Web Options panel of the Display Type dialog, specify the name, value of the checkbox/radio button in the Name and Value fields.
- In the Tool Tip field, enter the tip you want to show for the checkbox/radio button. Then when the report runs in HTML format or in Page Report Studio, when you hover the mouse over the checkbox/radio button, the tooltip will be displayed.
- Set Initially Checked to true if you want the checkbox/radio button to be selected by default.
- Check the Disabled checkbox if you want to make the checkbox/radio button disabled.
- Bind some web actions to the checkbox/radio button in the Web Behaviors box.
- Upon finishing, click OK to close this dialog.
Image button
To insert an image button and define its values:
- Do one of the following to insert the image button:
- Drag Image Button from the Toolbox panel to the destination.
- On the menu bar, click Insert > Web Controls > Image Button, then click the mouse button in the destination.
- On the Insert toolbar, click the down arrow on the Insert Control Objects button and select Image Button from the drop-down list, then click the mouse button in the destination.
- Right-click the image button and select Display Type from the shortcut menu. The Display Type dialog will appear.
- In the Web Options panel of the Display Type dialog, click the Browse button to specify the image source. For a DBField, formula, or a summary, you can also check the From DBField radio button to make the value of the DBField/formula/summary the image source. If you choose this option, the Decode Type drop-down list is enabled, from which you can specify the type for decoding the image.
- Enter the name, value of the image button in the Name and Value fields.
- Type a string in the Alternate Text field to serve as content when the image cannot be rendered.
- In the Tool Tip field, enter the tip you want to show for the image button. Then when the report runs in HTML format or in Page Report Studio, when you hover the mouse over the image button, the tooltip will be displayed.
- Check the Disabled checkbox if you want to make the image button disabled.
- Specify the scaling mode of the image button from the Scaling Mode drop-down list, and the maximum scaling ratio in the Max Ratio field. By default the scaling ratio of the image button is not limited. If it is set to any value greater than 0, the actual scaling ratio will be less than or equal to it.
- Specify the size of the image button.
- If you choose to use the original size of the image, check the Original Size option.
- If you want to use customized image size, uncheck Original Size, and then set the display width and height of the image in the Width and Height fields. Check the Constrain Proportion option if you want to constrain aspect ratio of the image when setting the width and height.
- Bind some web actions to the image button in the Web Behaviors box.
- Upon finishing, click the OK button to close the dialog.
Button
A button is for submitting or resetting a form.
To insert a button and define its values:
- Do one of the following to insert the button:
- Drag Button from the Toolbox panel to the destination.
- On the menu bar, click Insert > Web Controls > Button, then click the mouse button in the destination.
- On the Insert toolbar, click the down arrow on the Insert Control Objects button and select Button from the drop-down list, then click the mouse button in the destination.
- Right-click the button and select Display Type from the shortcut menu. The Display Type dialog will appear.
- In the Web Options panel of the Display Type dialog, enter the name, value of the button in the Name and Value fields.
- In the Tool Tip field, enter the tip you want to show for the button. Then when the report runs in HTML format or in Page Report Studio, when you hover the mouse over the button, the tooltip will be displayed.
- Select the action of the button: None, Submit Form or Reset Form.
- Check the Disabled checkbox if you want to make the button disabled.
- Bind some web actions to the button in the Web Behaviors box.
- Upon finishing, click OK to close this dialog.
List/Drop-down list
List and drop-down list are generally called multivalue containers. A list or drop-down list provides a list of values for users to select from. While, a drop-down list occupies a smaller space than a list box so that a report can be laid out more compactly.
To insert a list/drop-down list and define its values:
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Do one of the following to insert the list/drop-down list:
- Drag List/Drop-down List from the Toolbox panel to the destination.
- On the menu bar, click Insert > Web Controls > List/Drop-down List , then click the mouse button in the destination.
- On the Insert toolbar, click the down arrow on the Insert Control Objects button and select List/Drop-down List from the drop-down list, then click the mouse button in the destination.
- Right-click the list/drop-down list and select Display Type from the shortcut menu. The Display Type dialog will appear.
- In the Web Options panel of the Display Type dialog, enter a name for the list/drop-down list in the Name field.
- In the Tool Tip field, enter the tooltip you want to show for the list/drop-down list. Then when the report runs in HTML format or in Page Report Studio, when you hover the mouse over the list/drop-down list, the tooltip will be displayed.
- Specify the item labels and the value of each item in the items box by inputting some strings as the labels and values respectively.
If you want to use a DBField/formula field/parameter field to control the value, click 
in the Value column to insert one with the Insert Fields dialog, and then select the format for the inserted field from the drop-down list in the Item Label column. Check the All radio button in the Insert Field dialog if you want to add an All value to the list/drop-down list. Then when All is selected as value of the list/drop-down list at runtime, all filter actions defined on the list/drop-down list will not take effect, and if you applied some other web action that needs value from the list/drop-down list, a Null value will be returned.
- If the display type is defined as List, you can check the Allow Multiple Selections checkbox if you want to allow multiple items to be selected.
- In the Selected field, specify the selected value for the list/drop-down list.
- If you want to disable the list/drop-down list, check the Disabled option.
- Bind some web actions to the list/drop-down list in the Web Behaviors box.
- When done, click OK to apply the settings.
See also Display Type dialog for details about options in the dialog.
After a basic web control has been inserted, you can customize its appearance and behavior by setting properties in the Report Inspector, which can be saved as a CSS style for future use (for details, see Creating a CSS style).
Notes:
- The display type of a basic web control can also be changed after it has been created. Basic web controls other than list and drop-down list can be converted to each other, and can be displayed as a general type. You may notice that these web controls have a common Class Type property value "Label" in the Report Inspector, and this signifies that these web controls are labels in nature.
- List and drop-down list can be converted to each other, while cannot be displayed as any other type.
- DBFields, parameter fields, formula fields, summary fields, special fields, and images can also be displayed as a basic web control type. From this view, these objects can be considered as basic web controls too.
- Some of the basic web control values can be controlled by formulas. To control a value by a formula, click the button
behind the text field of the value and then select a formula from the drop-down list. If the given formulas cannot meet your requirements, click the <CREATE FORMULA> item in the list to create one as required.
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If you have specified a tooltip for any basic web control, when the report runs in HTML format or in Page Report Studio, the tooltip of the basic web control will be displayed differently on different browsers:
- On Internet Explorer, the tip text will be automatically wrapped if its length exceeds the maximal tip width the browser allows. In addition, for Internet Explorer, you can manually make some text displayed in a new line by adding 
 or 
 ahead of the text when editing it in the Tool Tip field.
- On Firefox, the tip text will be displayed in one line with the maximal tip width the browser allows, and the text that cannot be displayed within the width will be cut off and replaced by ellipsis.