Multi-layout documents are useful when you need to send two documents as one PDF. The first document contains a wide Grid/Graph that must be printed in landscape view. The second document, which uses a different dataset report, is a narrower document that should be printed in portrait view.
The solution is to create a multi-layout document, which means that each document is placed into its own layout within the same PDF. This creates a ”book” of documents. Each layout has its own grouping, page setup, and so on. The wider layout can be set to display in landscape, while the narrower layout can be set to display in portrait.
The layouts are displayed as tabs, so that you can easily switch between layouts.
Each layout is as powerful as a single document. You can edit the contents of each layout separately, without affecting the contents on other layouts in the document. For each layout, the following properties can be set independently of other layouts in the document:
Primary dataset
Grouping: Grouping the data sets up a type of hierarchy within the document, and an inherent or implied sort order for the data. For more information on grouping in general, see Grouping records in a document.
Sorting: For more information on sorting in general, see Sorting data in a document.
Layout/tab name: For more information, see Using the layout tabs.
Document headers and footers: When you add a layout, the Document Header and Document Footer sections are renamed Layout Header and Layout Footer. The Layout Header/Footer prints at the beginning/end of the layout.
Border and background color
Which sections are displayed and which are hidden in all views: For more information, see Hiding or displaying sections.
Paper size, margins, orientation, scaling, and horizontal fit/overflow
A multi-layout document shares the following with all the layouts it contains:
Document name
PDF properties: Includes graph resolution, bookmarks, and embedded fonts.
General exporting properties: Includes
whether to export all layouts or only the current layout, and Excel exporting
properties, such as whether to embed images .
For more information, see
Exporting
multi-layout documents.
Datasets: All the datasets used in any layout in the document are displayed in Dataset Objects, allowing you to use objects from any dataset in any layout. If you delete a dataset, it is deleted from the entire document, not just the current layout.
Default grid Autostyle: Default grid Autostyles define the default formatting for Grid/Graphs. See Formatting controls using control defaults for instructions to define it.
Whether conditional formatting is displayed: Conditional formatting, which is similar to thresholds in reports, formats specific controls depending on predefined criteria. This provides the flexibility to personalize documents based on the data returned by the dataset reports. For more information on conditional formatting, see Using conditional formatting in documents.
Table of contents: The first page of the PDF can be an interactive table of contents as the first page of the PDF. For more information on tables of contents, including examples and instructions, see Including interactive table of contents in PDFs.
Page headers and footers: By default, page headers and footers are shared for all layouts, although you can change this setting to have separate page sections for each layout. For more information, see Using separate page headers and footers for each layout.
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