Re: Is the 4gl 4.12/13/whatever compiler a bit smarter

>Thinking a little bit: one reason why PRINT isn't allowed in arbitrary >functions is because you can call arbitrary functions in either the page >header or the page trailer block, and if the function could do printing, it >would cause problems. Have you ever tried to conditionally print different >amounts of code in the page header on odd and even pages of a report? You >can't -- the headers are of a fixed size. Since I4GL isn't prepared to >handle variable length page headers and trailers, it can't allow you to >call a function which can do printing. At the moment, no function can do >printing, so there is no problem. It might have to stop you calling >functions in headers, or it would have to cope with variable length >headers. Actually, headers aren't as bad as variable length page trailers! This is a rather annoying feature. I have used reports to output pure postscript to print and it takes some rather discusting coding to achieve. It would be nicer if I could do ... format first page header call postscript_header() page header call postscript_page_headers() ... at least then it would be maintainable instead of having hundreds of lines of random postscript sitting there. -- ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ I am just a non-conformist who wants to fit in. Peter Jeffery, (IS Eng, P.A Data Design)