Hi, 

I am using DataEase for Windows Lite v7.1.311.0

I have 2 things I need help on:

I would like to make user menus, and the help file says it is under File - New - Menu however "Menu" doesn't come up as one of the options (only Form, Report and Procedure, plus Dos Reports which is greyed out).

The other thing I would like to do is get a procedure to print out a Word document (or a pdf). Is this possible? I was looking at OLE, but not sure if this is the right option, and the program crashed each time I tried it.

Can you help please?

1. DataEase 7 does not support Menu Documents. It was considered an "unnecessary" document type as it is really just a form with reduced functionality. You can simply do the same with a Form.

This assumption was not 100% correct and the Menu documents where restored in 8.2 but mostly due to problems with migration from DFW 5.x and DFW 6.x where they had been widely used and by migrating they were removed.

2. DataEase 7 Lite is a very old and limited version. Printing to PDF is easy from anything as the only thing you need to do is to install a PDF Printer on your computer. There are plenty of free ones out there like CutePDF http://www.cutepdf.com/

I know that DataEase 7 FULL came with an internal PDF printer but I'm not sure about LITE. However this driver was only licensed to work on the current OS (XP) so if you try to use it on Windows 7/8/10 it will not work.

So printing to a PDF as a one off is easy but to do it as part of document production/mail merging it is not possible.

DataEase 8.5 onwards support generating PDF natively.

Thanks for the help - I should be able to get a user menu working now. 

About the printing - your answer doesn't quite address what I need to do - I don't think I asked the right question. I want to write a procedure that does various things - enter a record etc. and at the end of it I want it to print out a word document (or a pdf of it if that is easier) that I have on my PC, but I don't know how (or if you can do it) to call up that document to print out. I don't really want to copy the document into the print layout as it is quite long, and may change from time to time, so it would be good just to call the current copy up to go to the printer. Can I do this?

Ahh..

I see what you mean.

The easiest then would be to print a PDF.

Adobe Acrobat Reader support command line switches.

The switches are as follows:

/n - Launch a new instance of Reader even if one is already open

/s - Don't show the splash screen

/o - Don't show the open file dialog

/h - Open as a minimized window

/p <filename> - Open and go straight to the print dialog

/t <filename> <printername> <drivername> <portname> - Print the file the specified printer.

Ant it is obviously the /t you are looking for.

"C:\Program Files (x86)\Adobe\Reader 10.0\Reader\AcroRd32.exe" /t c:\pdf\invoice.pdf

You obviously need to have the correct path to your version of Acrobat Reader.

You can use this from call program in a DQL or Button etc.

I know we fixed a lot of problems with call programs in 8.x so not sure how this will work in 7 but you just have to test it and figure a way around.

You might have to put it in a bat file and fire the bat file. If I’m not mistaken, one of the problems that is there in 7 is that it add .exe to the whatever it is you try to call which is obviously not idea when you fire it with arguments.

I think my workaround for that back in the day was to add an extra space or two after so that it wouldn’t make any meaning.

When calling a program with Path in windows you need to us “ “ if there is space in the path but you can’t use it if there isn’t. Who designed this I don’t know but he/she must be an imbecile ;-)