4.4 Freehand Shapes

To embed a shape in a report as part of the document flow, you need to add a Painter element to the report via the reporting API by implementing the Painter class. See the inetsoft.report.painter package in the API documentation.

You can add shapes to the page in a more straightforward way by using Layout mode. To add a shape, follow these steps:

1. Click the 'Layout View' button in the Style Studio toolbar to enter Layout mode. The Toolbox panel changes to show the available shapes.

Hold down the Shift key to force equal width and height (cir­cle or square).

2. Double-click a shape on the toolbar, and then draw the shape on the page.

 

3. To set the properties for a shape, right-click the shape, and select 'Properties' from the context menu. This opens the 'Property' dialog box for the shape.

Properties of ovals include dimension, location, line color, and fill color. Rectangles additionally provide a line style property. Lines provide an arrowhead option, and choice of arrowhead placement (start or end).

 

You can add shapes only to the first page of a tabular report. However, in a flow report, shapes are attached to a specific page layout. Therefore, if a page layout is set on the report level, the shapes will be drawn on all pages until the page layout changes. If the page layout is associated with a report element (see Associating a Page Area with a Report Element), the shapes will be drawn on all pages following the printed element until the page layout changes.

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