What are Styles?

Styles are a set of properties that you can apply to selected controls in your Page or RDLX reports to quickly change their appearance. A single style can define properties for font, background color, line spacing, border color, padding, and many more. You can create four different types of styles, namely Common, Text, Table Of Contents and Table Of Contents Level.

What are Style Sheets?

ActiveReports provides you with the ability to create multiple styles and store them in a style sheet. A style sheet can be understood as a collection of styles. You can add the style sheet to your Page or RDLX reports using the StyleSheetSource and StyleSheetValue properties and apply the styles to selected controls using the StyleName property. You can either embed the style sheet within your report or save it externally in the *.rdlx-styles format. 

There are two ways to use these style sheets:

• Embed the style sheets within the report and use its styles on controls in that report
• Save the style sheets externally in *.rdlx-styles format and use it in multiple reports 

Why use Styles?

Using styles gives you more control over how you format the report. Let us look at a few scenarios to understand how styles are helpful while designing reports.  

Reusing Styles

An organization wants to create an Annual Sales Report that consists of multiple subreports, representing Sales by District and Sales by Product. Since all the subreports are a part of the Annual Sales Report, the formatting needs to be consistent. You normally have to manually set properties for each control on the report to format it and then replicate those same set of properties for the two subreports. This can be time consuming and can lead to inconsistent styling in your reports. Let us see how the ActiveReports Style feature can help you generate consistent styles in all reports similar to the screenshot below.

Report author can create a style sheet for designing the Annual Sales Report (main report), add styles to the style sheet using the Stylesheet Editor dialog. After creating the styles, these styles can be applied to various controls on Annual Sales Report using the StyleName property.

Once the Annual Sales Report has been designed, the InheritStyleSheet property can be set to True (by default) for each subreport.

By setting the InheritStyleSheet property to True, the style sheet used for the Annual Sales Report is automatically inherited in the subreports. This makes all the styles in the style sheet available to the two subreports. To apply the styles to the report controls in a subreport, you simply need to select the report control and specify the name of the style you want to use in the StyleName property.

In this example we can see how styles can help save time and maintain consistent formatting by giving you the flexibility to use the same style sheet in multiple subreports.  

You can also use the same style sheet in multiple reports by saving the style sheets externally in *.rdlx-styles format.

Enhancing Report Portability

In ActiveReports, you can embed external style sheets in a report. This is particularly useful when you want to send reports that are styled using multiple style sheets. Let us take an example of a Sales Report to see how embedded style sheets can help improve the report portability. 

Scenario

An organization wants to send a Sales report that is styled using 4 different external style sheets. While sending the styled report, 5 files have to be sent together, i.e. one report and 4 external style sheets. The person receiving these files needs to maintain and store 5 different files. Moreover, if the location of a style sheet is changed from the path set in the report, the style sheet will no longer be applied to the report until the path is modified in the report.

By embedding the external style sheets within the Sales report, only 1 file needs to be sent which in turn improves the portability of the report.

 

ActiveReports provides you the ability to create styles and store them in a style sheet. You can add these style sheets to your Page or RDLX reports and apply the styles to selected controls using the StyleName property. You can also save these style sheets on your system.

The styles feature consists of the following elements.

• Style Sheet Properties
• Stylesheet Editor Dialog
• Add New Style Dialog
• Embed Stylesheet Dialog
• Open Embedded Stylesheet Dialog

Style Sheet Properties

Define the style sheet of a report in the Properties panel using the Source property and the Value property. For subreports, use the InheritStyleSheet property.

Property Name	Description
Source	The source of a report's style sheet. You can choose from the following options: External - Choose this option if the style sheet (*.rdlx-styles format) is located as an external source, such as a local file, an http location or a custom resource. To learn how to create external style sheets, see Working with External Style Sheets. Embedded - Choose this option if style sheet is embedded in the report. The embedded style sheets are displayed under the Embedded StyleSheets node of the Report Explorer.To learn how to create embedded style sheets, see Working with Embedded Style Sheets.
Value	The style sheet to apply to the report. You can choose from the following options: Expression - Opens the Expression Editor dialog to create a valid expression. New - Opens the New Stylesheet Editor dialog to create an external or embedded style sheet. Open file - Opens the Open Stylesheet from file dialog to navigate to a local style sheet file. This option is only available for external style sheets. For embedded style sheets, a list of available style sheets in the report is provided.
InheritStyleSheet	The style sheet to inherit in a subreport. Setting the InheritStyleSheet property to True (default value) inherits the style sheet of the main report in the subreport.

Stylesheet Editor Dialog

You can open the Stylesheet Editor dialog by selecting the Stylesheet Editor option from the Report menu of the standalone designer or Visual Studio .NET designer.

The Stylesheet Editor dialog consists of the following elements.

Elements	Description
Open Stylesheet from File	Opens a style sheet (*.rdlx-styles format) located externally.
Open Embedded Stylesheet	Opens a style sheet embedded in the report.
Save Stylesheet to File	Saves the current style sheet as an external style sheet in *.rdlx-styles format.
Embed Stylesheet	Embeds the current style sheet in the report.
New Style	Creates a new style in the current style sheet.
Remove Style	Removes a style from the current style sheet.
Property panel	Modifies the properties of the selected style based on the selected style type. Available style properties change depending on the type of style selected. You set the style type when you create a new style. The style type is selected when a new style is created.
OK	Saves the current style.
Cancel	Closes the dialog without saving the changes.

Add New Style Dialog

You can open the Add New Style dialog by clicking the New Style option in the Stylesheet Editor dialog.

The Add New Style dialog consists of the following elements.

Elements	Description
Name	Contains the name of the new style.
Type	Sets the type of control to which you can apply the style, which determines the options that are available in the Properties panel of the Stylesheet Editor dialog. Common Apply this style type to the following report controls: CheckBox Image List Tablix Shape Table TableOfContents TextBox Text Apply this style type to the TextBox report control. It includes all properties of the Common style type, plus it offers properties specific to the TextBox control. TOC Apply this style type to the TableOfContents control. TOC Level Apply this style type to the ToC.Level object of the TableOfContents control.
Parent	Represents the parent style of a new style. If the parent style is specified, the property values are taken from the selected parent style values. By default, the parent style is set to None.

Embed Stylesheet Dialog

You can access the Embed Stylesheet dialog by selecting the Save current Stylesheet option and then selecting Embed Stylesheet in the Stylesheet Editor dialog.

The Embed Stylesheet dialog consists of the following elements.

Elements	Description
Drop-down list box for style sheet name	Enter a name for the embedded style sheet, or choose an existing style sheet from the drop-down list box to overwrite.

Open Embedded Stylesheet Dialog

You can access the Open Embedded Stylesheet dialog by selecting the Open stylesheet option and then selecting Open embedded Stylesheet from the Stylesheet Editor dialog.

The Open Embedded Stylesheet dialog consists of the following elements.

Elements	Description
Drop-down list box for opening style sheet	Provides a drop-down list box to choose an existing style sheet to overwrite. You can also enter a new name for the style sheet here.

 

Working with Styles within a Style Sheet

For any of these operations, you first need to open the style sheet in the editor.

To open the editor for embedded style sheets

1. In the Report Explorer, expand the Embedded StyleSheets node and select the existing style sheet you want to edit.
2. Right-click and select Edit to open it in Stylesheet Editor dialog.
   

To open the editor for external style sheets

1. In the standalone designer or Visual Studio designer, click the Report menu and select the Stylesheet Editor.
2. In the Stylesheet Editor dialog, click the Open button and select the Open Stylesheet from File option.
   
3. In the Open dialog, navigate to the *.rdlx-styles file that you want to open.
4. Click Open to open the external stylesheet in the Stylesheet Editor.

To add a new style to a style sheet

1. In the Stylesheet Editor dialog, click the New Style button to add a new style.
2. In the Add New Style dialog, enter the Name of the style, and then select the Type and Parent style.
   
   Tip: For more information on the style types, see Working with Styles. To create style types for TableOfContents controls and heading levels, see Apply styles to the TableOfContents control and Apply styles to the TableOfContents levels.

To modify a style in a style sheet

1. In the Stylesheet Editor, select the existing style that you want to modify and use the property fields on the right to make the changes.
2. Click OK to save the changes.

To remove a style from a style sheet

1. In the Stylesheet Editor, select the style that you want to remove and click Remove Style.
2. Click OK to save the changes.

To use a style from a style sheet at design time

1. Click the gray area around the report to select it, and under the Properties panel, click the Property dialog link in the Commands section. See Properties panel for more information on how to access commands.
2. In the Report dialog, go to the Appearance page.
3. In the Appearance page, set the Stylesheet Source to Embedded and in the Value field select an existing embedded style sheet. (Or select External and select the <Open File> option and navigate to an *.rdlx-styles external style sheet.)
   
   Tip: You can also access the Source and Value properties in the Properties panel by expanding the Stylesheet node.
4. Click OK to close the dialog.
5. On the design surface, select the control you want to apply the style to.
6. In the Properties panel, from the StyleName property drop-down, select a style to apply to the controls.
   
   

Working with Embedded Style Sheets

Create and save a style sheet

1. In the Report Explorer, right-click the Embedded StyleSheets node, and select the Add Embedded Stylesheet option to access the Stylesheet Editor dialog.
   
   
   Tip: You can also access the Stylesheet Editor dialog from the Report Explorer by clicking the Add button and selecting Embedded Stylesheet. In the standalone designer or Visual Studio designer, from the Report menu, select Stylesheet Editor.
2. Click the Save button and select Embed Stylesheet to embed the style sheet into the report.
3. Enter a name for the style sheet or choose an existing style sheet from the drop-down to overwrite, and then click OK to save the embedded style sheet.

All the saved style sheets embedded in the report appear under the Embedded StyleSheets node in the Report Explorer.

Save embedded style sheet as an external style sheet

1. In the Report Explorer, expand the Embedded StyleSheets node and select the embedded style sheet.
2. Right-click and select Edit to open the Stylesheet Editor dialog.
3. In the Stylesheet Editor dialog, click the Open button and select the Save Stylesheet to file option to save the embedded style sheet externally.
   
   
4. In the Save As dialog, navigate to the location where you want to save the style sheet, provide a name for the style sheet and click the Save button to save it as an external *.rdlx-styles file.

Working with External Style Sheets

Create and save a style sheet

1. In the standalone designer or Visual Studio designer, click the Report menu and select the Stylesheet Editor.
2. In the Stylesheet Editor dialog, click the Open button and select the Save Stylesheet to file option.
3. In the Save As dialog, navigate to the location where you want to save the style sheet, provide a name for the style sheet and click the Save button to save it as an external *.rdlx-styles file.

Embed External style sheet into a report

1. In the standalone designer or Visual Studio .NET designer, click the Report menu and select the Stylesheet Editor.
2. In the Stylesheet Editor dialog, click the Open button and select the Open Stylesheet from file option.
   
3. In the Open dialog, navigate to the external style sheet (*.rdlx-styles file) that you want to load and click the Open button to load it in the Stylesheet Editor dialog.
4. In the Stylesheet Editor dialog, click the Save button and then select the Embed Stylesheet option.
   
5. In the Embedded Stylesheet dialog, enter a name for the style sheet and then click OK to embed the loaded style sheet into your report.

All the saved style sheets embedded in the report appear under the Embedded StyleSheets node in the Report Explorer.

Apply styles to the TableOfContents control

In the TableOfContents control, styles can be applied using the StyleName property.

1. Create a new style sheet and add styles that you want to apply to the TableOfContents control. For more information on creating style sheets and style types, see above sections.
2. Apply the style sheet to the report.
3. From the toolbox, drag and drop the TableOfContents control onto the report design surface, preferably at the start or end of the report layout to justify the significance of the control.
4. On the design surface, select the TableOfContents control.
5. In the Properties panel, from the StyleName property drop-down, select a style to apply to the TableOfContents control.

Apply styles to the TableOfContents levels

In the TableOfContents control, styles can be applied to each TableOfContents level using the StyleName property available in the LevelDesigner Collection Editor dialog.

1. Create a new style sheet and add styles that you want to apply for the TableOfContents level. For more information on creating style sheets and the type of styles available for TableOfContents level, see above sections.
2. From the toolbox, drag and drop the TableOfContents control onto the report design surface, preferably at the start or end of the report layout to justify the significance of the control.
3. With the TableOfContents control selected, click the Levels (Collection) property from the Properties panel and then click the ellipsis button that appears.
4. In the LevelDesigner Collection Edior dialog that appears, select a TableOfContents level on which to want to apply the style.
5. From the list of properties on the right, drop-down the StyleName property to select a style to apply.