Reports in Base are created directly or by a wizard. Both menu-entries start the Report-Builder. Only when I uninstall the Report-Builder the old wizard from OOo appears and I am able to create old reports. Many people have used this wizard before to get reports, which show the content in a table-form. Why couldn't we get a menu-entry for this old wizard beside the entries of the Report-Builder?
Robert, is this bug still valid when using a newer version of LO? http://www.libreoffice.org/download/pre-releases/
(In reply to comment #1) > Robert, is this bug still valid when using a newer version of LO? Yes.
I need to use the old (legacy) report designer/wizard which allows TABLES in reports, and multi-column layouts (i.e. same field-set repeated across the page) - the newer Report Builder does not have these functionalities. But I now cannot access this tool at all (in recent versions of LO). It it possible? (I used to be able to just disable the Report Builder and the legacy report designer/wizard would just 'appear'.) Please bring the old report designer back!
(In reply to comment #3) > I need to use the old (legacy) report designer/wizard (...) It it > possible? Don't install (or uninstall) the Report Builder, and you'll have legacy report designer.
Lionel: I don't quite understand your advice. I'm using LO v 4.2.0.4 and when I call-up the EXTENSION MANAGER list, there is no Report Builder (the newer one) on the list, yet selecting either 'Create Report in Design View' or 'Use Wizard to Create Report' still calls-up the newer Report Builder and NOT the legacy report designer. (The 'Type of Extension' boxes are all ticked). Maybe I'm missing something.
(In reply to comment #5) > I don't quite understand your advice. I'm using LO v 4.2.0.4 and when I > call-up the EXTENSION MANAGER list, there is no Report Builder (the newer > one) on the list It isn't shown any more in the extension list. You have to uninstall it whit the LO-setup. Don't know, how it works in other systems. Here, with *.rpm-packages, the report-builder is a package, which could be installed and uninstalled separately.
robert: "You have to uninstall it whit the LO-setup." I'm not sure how to do this. (I'm using Mac OS 10.6.8). I don't have much technical expertise. By the way, what is 'LO-setup'? A little more guidance would be much appreciated! Are there any links on tutorials for how to do it?
(In reply to comment #7) > "You have to uninstall it whit the LO-setup." > I'm not sure how to do this. (I'm using Mac OS 10.6.8). The people on this bug have even less MacOS X "expertise" than you. I suggest you ask a MacOS X guru / expert / ... What you want to achieve is a partial install; LibreOffice is made of some required components and some optional components. Report Builder is such an optional component. During the install procedure (at least on GNU/Linux and on Microsoft Windows), one gets the choice of which optional components one wants to install and which ones not. Where exactly that choice is on MacOS X, you need to ask a MacOS X guy. For user support questions such as these, you can try - http://ask.libreoffice.org - a user mailing list https://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/mailing-lists/ or through Nabble https://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/nabble-mailing-list-interface/ - IRC https://www.libreoffice.org/get-help/irc-help/ - and/or a MacOS X user forum alternatively to a LibreOffice forum
Lionel: Thank you for the additional information. On Mac OS, the LO installer is a .dmg 'package', and there is apparently no ability to instal separate 'components'. It's just 'all-or-none' for that particular LO version. I have looked most of the sources you mention without success, but I will follow-up your suggestions in more intensively, and report back. (It it very frustrating that it does not, at this stage, seem possible to easily use the legacy report designer component in recent versions of LO.). Surely a 'switch' could be added to the GUI??
(In reply to comment #9) > Surely a 'switch' could be added to the GUI?? The addition of that switch is the purpose of this enhancement request / bug report.
Lionel: Yes, that is understood. But WHY is this perfectly useful (and, in my opinion, superior) tool be so difficult to access in recent versions of LO? Surely there must be a relatively simple way of bringing it back? And why should the access process be different for Mac OS compared to the other platforms? (I hope someone is listening to feedback.)
Adding self to CC if not already on
(In reply to frofa from comment #11) > Lionel: > > Yes, that is understood. But WHY is this perfectly useful (and, in my > opinion, superior) tool be so difficult to access in recent versions of LO? > Surely there must be a relatively simple way of bringing it back? And why > should the access process be different for Mac OS compared to the other > platforms? (I hope someone is listening to feedback.) Wow, this is an old bug indeed. The report designer functionality was integrated directly into the macOS release build. You can not remove it (at least not any more or at least not via the unopkg cli). My guess is that the problem is at least the same now on Windows as well. Only distrib provided Linux builds provide a separate report designer package, that the user can choose to install or remove. Currently, reports that were created with the old C++ report designer tool code can be opened within an ODB as a Writer document, but they can not be edited other than by altering the Writer document itself.
(In reply to frofa from comment #11) > Lionel: > > Yes, that is understood. But WHY is this perfectly useful (and, in my > opinion, superior) tool be so difficult to access in recent versions of LO? > Surely there must be a relatively simple way of bringing it back? And why > should the access process be different for Mac OS compared to the other > platforms? (I hope someone is listening to feedback.) You used to be able to remove bundled extension and user/shared extensions via: unopkg list -- bundled / --shared and unopkg remove <package-name> This tool can be found in : LibreOffice.app/Contents/MacOS/unopkg However, that is no longer possible for those extensions that are now directly integrated into the LibreOffice build release (e.g. report designer and mysql native connector). You would probably have to go back to an older version, somewhere around LO4, in order to still be able to do this.
@frofa : if you're still around and still wondering, the change for the report builder occurred in bug 61950
I assume that the old functionality is still available in the code, just can't be accessed: I did a (macOS) LO master build configured with --disable-report-builder, and with a database open in LO, the Reports' Tasks section only contains a "Use Wizard to Create Report..." item, instead of the usual two "Create Report in Design View..." and "Use Wizard to Create Report..." items. And while --disable-report-builder's "Use Wizard to Create Report..." brings up a "Report Wizard" dialog that looks the same as the usual one, the document that opens up behind it looks different: Instead of the usual document with database-related toolbars at the top, and some orange-tinted Page Header/Detail/Page Footer sections, it opens a plain Writer document without toolbars and some Title/Author/Date lines. Can anyone confirm that that is the legacy report wizard that people ask to get access to again? Since the "trick" of uninstalling a Report Builder extension to get access to the legacy report wizard can no longer work (see bug 61950), we would need to find another way to offer access to it (possibly some third "Use Wizard to Create Legacy Report..." item in the Reports' Tasks section, or a flag in the Options dialog to switch between the two).
(In reply to Stephan Bergmann from comment #16) Hi Stephan, > > Can anyone confirm that that is the legacy report wizard that people ask to > get access to again? > Yes, I can confirm that your description is that of the old legacy report wizard, that people are referring to.
I seem to recall that there was also the possibility to insert an image as background from a pool of images, but that code (and corresponding images) might well have been removed ? The legacy code wizard was always a bit limited, which is why the Java report builder came into existence in the first place. The real question I guess though is - is it worth the effort to do something about ? Surely, most people today have moved on to using the Java report designer, even on Linux ? Lionel's comments were made 6 years ago. Could we not just make the current report builder the default for everyone, including on Linux, or is that something that distrib maintainers would throw their arms up in the air about ? Clearly, inconsistency in LO functionality such as this across OSes is undesirable, but is the correct solution more UI/UX development ?