Yes, Apparently this was fixed is a recent update. But with one missing peice it seems…What you describe is exactly how I did it to this point and almost working. I am new to this approach. A colleague more familiar with it pointed out a shortcoming which brings me to where I am now.
So, I am back to combing the posts including this one from Hannah-wan … “The Force is strong in one!” aka @hmwillett
Now that I am this far into it, it seems just a little farther to grab the results of the BAQ and pipe them into a same mechanism in Report Styles > snowman > “Generate Form” produces, makes into the BT Output folder (I cannot believe its there but I cannot get it there by printing with the standard print mechanism. Will next be trying to identify that with this new tracing approach. Any suggestions or refs are welcome!
For others that might want to or need to do this at some (Why would you knowingly do this to yourself?), here are the exact steps to an adhoc label prep, prior to being able to actually print it:
- Created the BAQ, which returns the record data to print, with Parameters for the Keys that identify the record uniquely, in this case, RMARcpt.RMANum, RMARcpt.RMALine, and RMARcpt.RMAReceipt. It does facilitate prompts to run the BAQ Designer when you first test it. I thought ‘Awesome’…saved.
- Launched the RDD form, Created a new RDD from scratch, with Report Type = Bartender Labels, saved.
- Added the BAQ in Step 1 as the data source, (No relationships needed), saved.
- Within this RDD, next defined new Report Criteria ID, saved, saw that it now appears as a link, drilled into it. This step surprised me a little. It gleans, the parameters from the BAQ as source mappings. ‘Cool’. After a bit of poking around and a couple of mistakes, I found in its elipsis (snowman), the command “Create Report Criteria Prompts from Selected”, and backed up.
- Selected the three gleaned Criteria Mappings check boxes. Saved.
- Now used that “Create Report Criteria Prompts…” command. It creates the basic Prompts in the panel layer above called Criteria Prompts.They are links so drilled in.
- Double checked each of the data types, sequence etc, saved, Up and into next one, repeat. Saving each time.
- Launched Report Styles and created a New Report ID, (not a style on an existing Report). Save. Created its report Style. Report Type = Bartender Labels. Ref the RDD in the Data Definition dropdown. Ref Report Location on Bartender server. Ref output location on BT server.Save. Form changes a bit and Report Criteria appears. Select the Report Criteria defined in step 4. Go to "Generate Form and get my prompts, fill them in and finally get a well formed BT file in the output folder. ‘Wow! I’m thinking those BAQ prompts are going to flow all the way to this Report style and ‘automagically’ present at print time… super cool.’
- Go to RMA Receipt line I have been using and print, selecting the Report Style in step 8, with great confidence that the missing parameter key issue has been resolved. No prompts presented. Hmm? Same error as all the other times. Grrr!
Silly Me! My naive assumption was that the BAQ parameters/prompts have carried through to this end and that the standard Print mechanism would prompt and print. But as it turns out, the standard print mechanism has no idea whatsoever that there are parameters now containing keys or what to do with them anyway. It has no sight into those or the dataset in general as evidenced from other print attempts using an modified RMAForm, I tried to leverage that but found no way to add the necessary tables and provide the specific record keys. I presumed too much. Honestly, if there was just a little more awareness in the printing mechanism working with the Report Style chosen, to also do some criteria gleaning from the report style, it would be a decent adhoc label creation work flow.
Now, my goal is to convey those parameters to something… and then print that, and not with the standard print mechanism!