What is the correct way to align text in Filemaker (6 pro)? We are having
lots of fun in WinXP trying to get text that has been entered in a text box
and aligned in a table format to print out as it looks on screen. Tabs don't
seem to work and spaces are a little better but still misalign wildly. At
the moment we are having to print to PDF then insert white dots (as Acrobat
seems to go mental too when adding a space [it jumps about 3 tabs worth of
space or more sometimes]).

This is an example of what we are doing:

text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
text
text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
text
                   Column Heading    2nd Column Heading
                             34                             34
                             54                             67
text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
text
text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
text
etc...

but it comes out like this whether we use spaces or tabs:

text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
text
text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
text
                         Column Heading    2nd Column Heading
                                        34
34
                             54                                67
text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
text
text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
text

i.e. all of the place and not just a little bit either. Any ideas?

Sorry - it should have come out like:

This is an example of what we are doing:

text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
                   Column Heading    2nd Column Heading
                             34                             34
                             54                             67
text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
etc...

but it comes out like this whether we use spaces or tabs:

text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
                         Column Heading    2nd Column Heading
                                        34                                34
                             54                                67
text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text

nospam <nospam@nospam.com> wrote:

> (snip)
> 
> Tabs don't seem to work
> 
> (snip)

What do you mean by this? In my copy of FM they work.

-- 
Henk B

> What do you mean by this? In my copy of FM they work.

Well, I've just tried putting tabs at every point in the line where white
space is used instead of mixtures of spaces and tabs, thus:

text text text text text text text text text text
tab heading tab tab heading
tab number tab tab number
tab number tab tab number
text text text text text text text text text text

....which works fine except that everything is left aligned to the heading,
instead of centred under the heading. When spaces (any number) are added
before the number to centre it, it all goes wrong.

In article <1gh82is.fdh4ca1jez3fkN%henk.invalid@address.invalid>,
henk.invalid@address.invalid (Henk B) wrote:

>nospam <nospam@nospam.com> wrote:
>
>> (snip)
>> 
>> Tabs don't seem to work
>> 
>> (snip)
>
>What do you mean by this? In my copy of FM they work.
>


I'm having a similar problem.  Tabs work, but they don't easily copy
and/or export.  What I'm trying to set up is an order confirmation email
generated and mailed out of FM.  This involves including in the body a
horizontal string of text and number fields (item name, price, price
extension, etc.) representing the current found set.

I'm building my email body with a script that fills a global field with
all the line items.  One way I've tried to do this is have the script go
to a list layout that has only the fields I need, copy all records, then
return to the layout with the global email body field and paste.

This works, but each field becomes separated by a single space.  Next
option is a looping script to go through my found set and set the global
field to a concatenation of field & tab & nextfield & tab, etc.  The
second line would be Insert Calculated Result: global-field & paragraph
symbol & field & tab ... etc.

I have made a small global field containing one tab character I use to
build these.

I have yet to get it to the point of making an actual email to see what it
looks like, but I have my doubts about the tab character's ability to
survive the transition from FM to email.  Besides, as the item description
field is pretty variable, this cause the fields that follow to tab into
areas that do not line up vertically.

I'm beginning to think I should pad out these fields with spaces instead. 
I recall some discussion here a while ago about a calc that would add
trailing spaces to a variable field length to make a field that was always
exactly the same number of characters.  That is, if my text is 12
characters long, it will add eight spaces to make 20.  If it is four
characters, it will add 16.

Even *that* may not really work in the resulting email, as so many of
today's email clients do not display with mono-spaced fonts, so strings of
trailing spaces would squash together, breaking the fields out of vertical
alignment.

I guess I don't have a specific question, more of an indication of the
result I need, what I've tried to do, and a plea for someone who's been
here before to offer advice.

Steve Brown

nospam wrote:


> ...which works fine except that everything is left aligned to the heading,
> instead of centred under the heading. When spaces (any number) are added
> before the number to centre it, it all goes wrong.
> 

Use center tabs instead of left-aligned tabs.

in article 40fd090d$0$4960$afc38c87@news.easynet.co.uk, nospam at
nospam@nospam.com wrote on 7/20/04 4:59 AM:

>> What do you mean by this? In my copy of FM they work.
> 
> Well, I've just tried putting tabs at every point in the line where white
> space is used instead of mixtures of spaces and tabs, thus:
> 
> text text text text text text text text text text
> tab heading tab tab heading
> tab number tab tab number
> tab number tab tab number
> text text text text text text text text text text
> 
> ...which works fine except that everything is left aligned to the heading,
> instead of centred under the heading. When spaces (any number) are added
> before the number to centre it, it all goes wrong.
> 
> 
There are two ways of setting Tabs in FileMaker. On the layout out level,
you can set them globally for the field but using the Format > Text >
Paragraph, and you can use the Turn on View Text Ruler and then Highlight
the row or rows to apply the tabs to and then as you would in a Word
Processor, click where you want the tabs. They default to Left, but if you
double click on them, you can change them to center, decimal, or right and
you can apply lead characters if you want.

HTH

Lee

in article BD226060.92B4%canepa6645@charter.net, Lee Smith at
canepa6645@charter.net wrote on 7/20/04 5:38 AM:

That was not very clear, let me try it again.
> 
> in article 40fd090d$0$4960$afc38c87@news.easynet.co.uk, nospam at
> nospam@nospam.com wrote on 7/20/04 4:59 AM:
> 
--snip--

There are two ways of setting Tabs in FileMaker.

1). In the Layout Mode, you can set them globally for the field by going to
Menu > Format > Text > Paragraph.

2). In Browse Mode, View > Text Ruler
Then go to the Field and highlight the row (or rows) you want to apply the
tabs to, and then click in the Ruler where you want the Tabs. You can change
their location by dragging them left or right and change the type by double
clicking on them (they default to Left), and then choosing center, right, or
decimal, and you can apply lead characters if you want.

HTH

Lee

Not sure specifically what you are trying to do, but once you add tabs 
within your text, and put that text onto a layout (either as a field or 
as a text block), then you need to go into tab formatting (under the 
line spacing menu) and set up whatever tab stops you want and whatever 
alignment you want for each tab stop.

nospam wrote:
>>What do you mean by this? In my copy of FM they work.
> 
> 
> Well, I've just tried putting tabs at every point in the line where white
> space is used instead of mixtures of spaces and tabs, thus:
> 
> text text text text text text text text text text
> tab heading tab tab heading
> tab number tab tab number
> tab number tab tab number
> text text text text text text text text text text
> 
> ...which works fine except that everything is left aligned to the heading,
> instead of centred under the heading. When spaces (any number) are added
> before the number to centre it, it all goes wrong.
> 
> 

-- 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Howard Schlossberg              (818) 883-2846
FM Pro Solutions       Los Angeles, California
Associate Member, FileMaker Solutions Alliance

in article 40FD4314.9010306@antispahm.fmprosolutions.com, Howard Schlossberg
at howard@antispahm.fmprosolutions.com wrote on 7/20/04 9:06 AM:

Hi Howard,

Are you having trouble getting the Post today?

This is the same thing I said 3 hours ago.

Lee

> Not sure specifically what you are trying to do, but once you add tabs
> within your text, and put that text onto a layout (either as a field or
> as a text block), then you need to go into tab formatting (under the
> line spacing menu) and set up whatever tab stops you want and whatever
> alignment you want for each tab stop.
> 
> nospam wrote:
>>> What do you mean by this? In my copy of FM they work.
>> 
>> 
>> Well, I've just tried putting tabs at every point in the line where white
>> space is used instead of mixtures of spaces and tabs, thus:
>> 
>> text text text text text text text text text text
>> tab heading tab tab heading
>> tab number tab tab number
>> tab number tab tab number
>> text text text text text text text text text text
>> 
>> ...which works fine except that everything is left aligned to the heading,
>> instead of centred under the heading. When spaces (any number) are added
>> before the number to centre it, it all goes wrong.
>> 
>> 

Sorry -- I just responded as I saw them -- didn't see your response til 
later.

Lee Smith wrote:
> in article 40FD4314.9010306@antispahm.fmprosolutions.com, Howard Schlossberg
> at howard@antispahm.fmprosolutions.com wrote on 7/20/04 9:06 AM:
> 
> Hi Howard,
> 
> Are you having trouble getting the Post today?
> 
> This is the same thing I said 3 hours ago.
> 
> Lee
> 
> 
>>Not sure specifically what you are trying to do, but once you add tabs
>>within your text, and put that text onto a layout (either as a field or
>>as a text block), then you need to go into tab formatting (under the
>>line spacing menu) and set up whatever tab stops you want and whatever
>>alignment you want for each tab stop.
>>
>>nospam wrote:
>>
>>>>What do you mean by this? In my copy of FM they work.
>>>
>>>
>>>Well, I've just tried putting tabs at every point in the line where white
>>>space is used instead of mixtures of spaces and tabs, thus:
>>>
>>>text text text text text text text text text text
>>>tab heading tab tab heading
>>>tab number tab tab number
>>>tab number tab tab number
>>>text text text text text text text text text text
>>>
>>>...which works fine except that everything is left aligned to the heading,
>>>instead of centred under the heading. When spaces (any number) are added
>>>before the number to centre it, it all goes wrong.
>>>
>>>
> 
> 

-- 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Howard Schlossberg              (818) 883-2846
FM Pro Solutions       Los Angeles, California
Associate Member, FileMaker Solutions Alliance

> Not sure specifically what you are trying to do, but once you add tabs
> within your text, and put that text onto a layout (either as a field or
> as a text block), then you need to go into tab formatting (under the
> line spacing menu) and set up whatever tab stops you want and whatever
> alignment you want for each tab stop.

Thanks guys, but the problem still persists - when we need to print to PDF,
using Acrobat where the tabs are some jump or don't move where they are
supposed to be, resulting in misalignment, its like in the PDF, the tab
characters are reassigned a spacing value which isn't the same as the
Filemaker screen display.

Print out on paper, likewise is completely different from the screen. The
same spacing as in the PDF occurs - ie not what is on the screen - I'm not
talking about a few pixels either this is like a good one and a half
centimetres out and there's no explanation as far as these tab features are
concerned...

eyebrown@mindspring.com wrote:

> In article <1gh82is.fdh4ca1jez3fkN%henk.invalid@address.invalid>,
> henk.invalid@address.invalid (Henk B) wrote:

>>>Tabs don't seem to work

> 
> I'm having a similar problem.  Tabs work, but they don't easily copy
> and/or export. 


Tab characters are used as a standard field separator. You've heard of 
tab delimited files or tab separated files? Because of this FMP exports 
another character instead of a tab.  Or so I thought - the help file for 
v5.5 says:

- Tabs in fields are converted to spaces.
- Carriage return characters in a field export as ASCII 11 vertical tab 
characters.
- Values in repeating fields are separated by the ASCII 29 character.

Any chance of using merge fields in separate text blocks for each individual
value?  This might mean separating chunks of text within a single field into
several separate fields or even fields with related tables.

Text blocks can be made to line up very nicely as objects on a layout, and
what you see is pretty much what the printer prints.

Another (probably easier) idea: the first value from the second column
heading appears to be wrapping.  Could you reduce the white space between
the left margin and first columns at all?

Bridget Eley

in article 40fceeb2$0$6383$afc38c87@news.easynet.co.uk, nospam at
nospam@nospam.com wrote on 20/7/04 8:06 PM:

> What is the correct way to align text in Filemaker (6 pro)? We are having
> lots of fun in WinXP trying to get text that has been entered in a text box
> and aligned in a table format to print out as it looks on screen. Tabs don't
> seem to work and spaces are a little better but still misalign wildly. At
> the moment we are having to print to PDF then insert white dots (as Acrobat
> seems to go mental too when adding a space [it jumps about 3 tabs worth of
> space or more sometimes]).
> 
> This is an example of what we are doing:
> 
> text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
> text
> text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
> text
>                  Column Heading    2nd Column Heading
>                            34                             34
>                            54                             67
> text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
> text
> text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
> text
> etc...
> 
> but it comes out like this whether we use spaces or tabs:
> 
> text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
> text
> text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
> text
>                        Column Heading    2nd Column Heading
>                                       34
> 34
>                            54                                67
> text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
> text
> text text text text text text text text text text text text text text text
> text
> 
> i.e. all of the place and not just a little bit either. Any ideas?
> 
> 

-- 

(to email direct, replace "DOT" with "." and remove ".invalid")