Hello all,
My first post here and I am a minimalist CR2008 user. My company's ERP system exports reports to CR, and in the case of our MRP report, I taught myself to add a few fields (objects?) to a group header section and then use the Group Expert to sort the report using the added fields. The fields I'm adding are conveniently sitting just below where I need them in a different (greyed-out) header, so I just make room for them by resizing other fields and copy and paste. All of this affects only 1 row in the header.

The problem arises when I export to Excel afterward. I use Excel VBA scripts to modify the spreadsheet. If, in CR, I don't size all the fields (both the ones I resized and the ones I added) the same each time I go through the process, the export to Excel ends up in different columns and the VBA script doesn't work.

When I looked up saving the modified report as a template so I don't have to do all of this each time, I got the impression that templates in CR can only be created from scratch. Is that correct? Also, I'm not sure if a template would work since the canned report needs to be recreated in our ERP system (where I have no control) once a month. Once I export the canned report, I'm not sure how I would apply the template.

I am not using the snap tool--just freehanding all of this. For now, my solution is copying the Object Size and Position screen for all of the fields in question to a Word file so I can try to come as close to those numbers as possible the next time. Painful. Any ideas for improvement would be very appreciated. I was going to include a picture but don't have a hosting site handy.

Thanks,
Nick

Edited by nickEG - 24 Jun 2015 at 3:06am

OK thanks for confirming that I'm not missing something super obvious. I'm not too worried about the perfect look or widths in the export since the macro can fix that; just that the fields land in the same columns each time. I'll experiment with the vertical guidelines. My current method isn't that bad for once a month sizing 5 objects. I appreciate the advice!