Vivid Help Systems Pty Ltd - Clarion EmailReport Nettalked Template

Email Report Nettalked 6.13

Introduction

Installation

Usage

Conversion

Introduction

Email Report Nettalked for Clarion 5~5.5~6.3 ABC/Legacy. Template lets you email Clarion reports with CapeSoft Nettalk template (not included!) in the user-friendliest way - right in the body of email message. Besides you can duplicate report in RTF format to print it from any email program and/or OS. Perfect tool for un-attendant and/or bulk emailing. Compatible with ABC/Legacy Clarion Report, CPCS, RPM, DAS, Tintools and Icetips report templates.

Do whatever you want, but please do not move cursor on top of the -> image! Download 'Try before buy' shareware version of template and test it right in your application. You can have a quick look at emails generated by template as well.

Email Report Nettalked has very much the same functionality as does it's grandfather -

Email Report. The only difference - it sends emails with CapeSoft Nettalk template

rather than MS Outlook Express. It makes this template independent of any particular

email program. Besides by default it works without preview so it allows developers

to easily implement un-attendant emailing as well as posting bulk emails.

It's important to stress that this template works in conjunction with CapeSoft NetTalk only.

So if you don't own latter template, you won't be able to use EmailReport Nettalked!

Email Report Nettalked is compatible with Clarion, CPCS, RPM, DAS, Tintools, and Icetips

report templates. These report templates are directly supported.

Besides template has special embed template that can help

to employ template with much wider range of report templates.

To ensure that your customers will be able to print/preview emailed report with

any email program and/or Operating System, report can be duplicated

as attachment of RTF type. This file can be opened/printed even

with Windows WordPad program, so no 3d party program is required.

Download generated by template RTF file for testing.

You have an option to use template just for saving your reports

in this universal RTF format. So later you can retrieve any of archived

report, view, print and, if you have MS Word, email and even fax it!

Besides you can define up and down navigation arrows with any GIF image

including animated ones. So you can make your emails as vivid as you like :-).

Optionally you can put a note right in the email body.

Advantages of using template:

Emailing is fully automated so you can easily implement un-attendant emailing
and for instance email reports to a number of clients automatically each day.
Your program will be independent of any particular email program
your clients might be using.
Report can be saved to disc in RTF format. In this mode you will
see just created RTF in default Windows RTF editor (MS Word or Windows
NotePad 95-XP) and will be able to save it anywhere and with any name you like.
Optionally you can do it in silent mode.
Compatible with Clarion 5, Clarion 5.5, and Clarion 6.3 ABC/Legacy
It does not need or do any changes to either Clarion native
or 3d party templates. It's taboo for us!
Compatible with all major 3d party report templates: CPCS, RPM, DAS
previewer, Tintools and Icetips previewer
As to technical side, Email Report Nettalked as all our templates is a
white box template (no extra DLLs to ship)
You can let your customers to decide whether to send report
in body or as RTF attachment or both
You can send and play audio files with your emails
Network friendly - can be run by many network users simultaneously
Works in multi-dll applications
To make your email more attractive you can define up and down
navigation arrows with any GIF picture, even animated (examples below).

New features in version 6.1

Landscape report support
No need to manually select both template chain
and basic report template
Direct support for Icetips previewer
Option to define email priorities (High, Low, Normal)
new internal help
True multi-dll support

Installation

Run the installation wizard. It will guide you through a few simple steps. That is it.

IMPORTANT: If you are using Clarion 5 or 5.5, after selecting Clarion5 or C55 directory wizard

will offer you to install it into C:\Clarion5\Clarion6 or C:\C55\Clarion6 directory respectively.

So do not forget to get rid of last \Clarion6. But even if you do - it is not a problem.

Just uninstall template and run installation once again.

To start using template you have to manually register it.

Here is instruction: Open Clarion (no application must be open).

Go to menu Setup -> Template Registry ->Register. Select new template

ntemlrpt.tpl and then hit Open button

View animated reminder on how to do that - Registering Template

(built with our JAVA Animated Help Builder).

Using Template

Global Extension Template

First of all you have to install global Email Report Nettalked extension template into your

application containing report(s) you want to email (no matter DLL it is or EXE)

In multi-dll application you have to insert this Extension into your main definition DLL

(which has all file, template, and ABC definitions) as well.

Template chain prompt is now deprecated so it is always disabled.

(Email Report Nettalked Template does it automatically now).

Optionally you can define email background colour here one for all reports.

Later you can override it for any report you like (see picture below).

Email Report Nettalked supports global image shrinking. But you have an option

to override it locally for each report. You can use either numbers or your variable here.

We added this shrinking feature for developers who are kin

on printing emails or eager to send landscape reports.

The rule of thumb - the more you shrink image the worse

quality of image you have, so use this option with care. But in some cases it'll

help you to print email more economically or fit wide report into email body.

You can try changing report fonts. Bold font always gives much better

performance. And shrinking almost has not got any influence on

quality of printed email.

You have to keep in mind that RTF using the same shrinking factor as does

image in email body.

There is a new setting which you cannot find in all other email templates of ours -

Define email setting variables globally. It goes without saying that if this checkbox

is checked - all email settings will have global scope or local - otherwise.

The last 2 prompts are optional. These are internal RTF document property.

So your customers will never see them. Nevertheless you can leave here

your "signature" if you want to.

By default template creates subdirectory \VH\ under your working directory

to keep temporary template files. On some networks it can cause problems.

So the last prompt is the place where you can override this default behaviour.

Template creates global variable associated with this prompt GLO:WorkingDir

So you can specify any other directory like that: GLO:WorkingDir = 'C:\Temp'

In this case template will use C:\Temp on each workstation to build all required files.

Even if this directory does not exist, template will create it.

It will even create nested directories for you! So if you prime this

variable to say C:\Temp\A\B\C you will find that directory structure.

And if you do not use this variable template will work as always, that is

it will create working directory \VH\ on the server under your working

directory and use that.

Normally Keep report pages checkbox should be OFF. When ticked it will

save all temporary WMF report pages in the working directory.

You might need it when using non-standard reports to estimate

those picture sizes. Do not forget to sent it OFF before program release.

Though even if you do, it will not cause any inconveniences to your end-users.

The only difference it makes - their working directory will be a little bit larger.

For more info please hit the question marked help buttons

To make NetTalk happy, you have to include global NetTalk extension -

Activate NetTalk - here as well.

Procedure Extension Template

First of all, each report will need both EmailReport Nettalked and the CapeSoft

Include NetTalk Object procedure extensions.

Base class for the latter is Net Email Send. NetTalk defaults to

Object Name ThisNetSomething.

If you change it, don't forget to change respective prompt in Email Report

Nettalked (picture below, general tab). Apart from that there are no

restrictions on using NetTalk email engine. So you can use it as if there

were no EmailReport Nettalked template around.

Picture below shows all settings you have to define in report extension.

To open a Tab other than first just move the cursor on top of it.

General Tab

Report behaviour depends on one global variable only - NERG:Mode

You can use either numbers or pre-defined equates. We put them on the last tab

so you can copy and paste them into your code from there:

0 - NERQ:Print         !Print as ordinary report
1 - NERQ:InBodyRTF !Email in Body and RTF
2 - NERQ:InBody      !Email in Body only
3 - NERQ:InRTF       !Email in RTF only
4 - NERQ:Save        !Preview RTF (and save manually)
5 - NERQ:SilentSave !Save silently

So it is a sort of EmailReport Nettalked Global Request. In other words, if you say:

NERG:Mode = NERQ:EmailInBody; YourReport() - report will be emailed

in email body etc.

Here you have to select your Basic Report template from the combo.

You can find it - on the bottom of the first tab - General.

(see picture below):

It defaults to whatever report template it can see in current report procedure.

It is important to stress that this is just a suggestion. So if you want,

you can reselect any other report template. You might want to do it only in exceptional

situations. For instance when you want to apply embed template to solve some unusual

requests of end-users (email and print at the same time etc.). Or you have some uncommon

hybrid say CPCS + RPM. We provide examples for each of those directly supported templates

in Clarion*/Examples/NtEmlRpt directory so you can investigate recommended

template settings there.

IMPORTANT: If you want to try to use this template with any report template

other than directly supported (Clarion, CPCS, RPM, DAS, Tintools, and Icetips),

we would strongly recommended you to download free shareware version

of template to make sure it will work. You have to selects Other from the Basic

report template prompt and use embed template. You should do the same if you

want to use this embed in one of supported report templates.

It can help you to satisfy some unusual needs of your clients. Email and

print report at the same time, for instance.

In template examples you can find how this embed can be used.

Report Tab

You can specify name of RTF attachment file either from a variable or

by hard-coding it from the prompt as well (using say 'ReportCopy' will create

attachment ReportCopy.rtf). If you use variable just put it's name.

or find it from lookup button. No exclamation marks are required!

You have to keep in mind that RTF using the same shrinking factor as does

image in email body.

You can define image shrinking factor applicable for both body and RTF reports

and specify variable names for RTF file name and path for saving reports.

The rule of thumb - the more you shrink image the worse

quality of image you have, so use this option with care. But in some cases it'll

help you to print email more economically or fit wide report into email body.

You can try changing report fonts. Bold font always gives much better

performance. And shrinking almost has not got any influence on

quality of printed email.

Starting from version 6 you have full control of report sizing (both in Body and RTF).

By default template supports A4 reports. So the only thing you have to

do to them is to specify if report has Landscape layout.

To define report margins (for RTF) and report width and height template generates and

uses 4 global variables: NERG:RTFleft, NERG:RTFtop, NERG:RTFwidth, and NERG:RTFheight.

Those values should be specified in 1/1000th of an Inch (Clarion default units).

The simplest way to estimate your report sizes is to collect WMFs by setting

global Keep report pages checkbox ON. Then open any of WMFs with Windows

MS Paint and from Image -> Attributes menu find out the sizes in Inches.

Do not forget to multiply it by 1000. It is important to understand that all

that should be done only if you use non-standard report sizing. You will know it

immediately because improper sizing dramatically decrease report quality.

So if you see something like that - time has come to check report sizes:

Otherwise you can completely ignore Position Group.

The type of prompt used for all 4 size variables

lets you define them either with variable or implicitly as a number.

So you can use predefined variables. You can

define and use your own variables for that. At last you can just

put a margin value right into corresponding prompt. As long as you follow

standard Clarion syntax you won't have any compile errors.

Optionally you can define images to use for navigation up and down arrows.

We ship a number of arrow GIFs with template:

It goes without saying you are welcome to use any others.

IT'S VERY IMPORTANT to remember that those images should be available at runtime.

So you should ship them with your application either in the working directory or in a

subdirectory of your working directory (where the main EXE is).

Email Tab

This tab has just a list of variables required by NetTalk template to send email.

It's your responsibility to prime them properly before calling report.

For more detailed see our example application.

With the button at the bottom you can open list of variables you can usually go without.

Both compulsory and optional prompts accept any valid Clarion strings. Use lookup

buttons to find and append any filed from your Application like you do for formulas.

Body Tab

Optionally you can define a heading comment here. Just follow plain

Clarion syntax and build any letter you like. Especially this option might be useful

when you send report as RTF attachment only. So you could explain here what to do

with this attachment.

Everything you add here goes directly into embedded email HTML file.

So you can use HTML tags as well. (Tag usually starts with something

like <font> and ends with </font>. It can be <img> and </img> etc.)

Just remember that each tag should occupy one line in the body queue.

This restriction comes from the way we build message body, not from HTML syntax.

To make life easier we put new-line tag after each line of HTML

So if you try to split a tag on more than one line - this tag will get broken.

by the new-line tag inserted by template

And one more thing to keep in mind - template stores that note in NERQ:BodyQue

global queue. So for extra flexibility you can completely ignore Body Note template Tab

and populate this queue directly from special embed: EmailReport - After filing queues.

So just use usual queue handling:

FREE(NERQ:BodyQue)
NBQ:Line = 'Line No 1'
ADD(NERQ:BodyQue)
NBQ:Line = 'Line No 2'
ADD(NERQ:BodyQue)
NBQ:Line = 'Line No 3'
ADD(NERQ:BodyQue)

If you omit FREE() function call, template will append those lines to

whatever you have already specified in the Body Note template prompt.

If you want you can play audio files in your emails as well. You have to specify

a Sound file and how many times you want it to be played.

Like the arrow image files those sound files must be available at runtime. So you

have to ship them with your application.

From our experience not all users appreciate this feature. So it's better

to show them such 'talking' emails first :-)

Attachments Tab

Email Report Nettalked takes care about Reports in RTF attachment. So

this attachment prompt allows you to specify list of any other files

to be sent with your emails.

Both attachments and email body lines are stored in 2 global queues (NERQ:AttachmentQue

and NERQ:BodyQue respectively). So for all emails you can use just template settings

that will populate those queues for you. But if you do not want to bother - you

can directly populate those queues from an embed point we created for you -

EmailReport Nettalked - After filling Body/Attachment queues.

Like email body note, these attachments are stored in global queue (NERQ:AttachmentQue)

So for all emails you can use either template settings or populate this queue directly

from the same embed point. You can combine those 2 methods as well.

Something like this will do:

NAQ:FileName = 'C\Temp\Note.doc'
ADD(NERQ:AttachmentQue)
NAQ:FileName = 'C\Windows\help.doc'
ADD(NERQ:AttachmentQue)
...

See example for details.

Equates Tab

It's just a place where you can copy predefined equates for pasting them

into your code. It's not used by template at all. So you can store anything

you like here.

We installed example into your Clarion (Clarion5 or C55) Examples/NtEmlRpt

directory so for various settings you can investigate the source.

If you have installed C55 only you have to recompile Demo to run :-(

IMPORTANT: In email mode report cannot go without preview, so

you should always keep the Print Preview checkbox ON no matter which

basic report template you are using.

Control template

By default Email Report Nettalked template sends emails silently without preview.

For those who will try to build their own email preview this control template

can save some time. You can find few examples in our demo application.

Conversion from previous versions

Only if you use CPCS basic report template or Other,

you have to reselect it from the basic report template combo on

the General Tab: newcomer - Icetips template - needs space.

We apologize for any inconvenience these changes might cause.

TIPS (you are welcome to send your tips in this area!)

1. To compile our application from C55\Examples\EmlRptNt\Demo subdirectory,
    you need all 3d party Report templates (CPCS, RPM etc.) If you don't have them
    (and we'd like to stress there is nothing wrong with it), you can find application
    free of them (or some) in other subdirectories: \Clarion, \CPCS etc.

2. Only if you use 5.5F or C5.5G Legacy, you have to fix a Soft Velocity bug
    that screws up a number of 3d party Legacy templates. Basically you have to:
    search your CW.TPL file for the following line:

     #SET(%CWTemplateVersion,'v5.5')
     and replace it with these lines:
     #! #SET(%CWTemplateVersion,'v5.5')
     #SET(%CWTemplateVersion,'v2.003')

     If you can't find the above line then look for the following line....

     #EQUATE(%CWTemplateVersion,'v5.5')
     and replace it with the following.....

     #! #EQUATE(%CWTemplateVersion,'v5.5')
     #EQUATE(%CWTemplateVersion,'v2.003')

     Read more: http://www.thetingroup.com/news.htm

3. To get some quick help you can hit any of those question-marked buttons
(picture below). It's new type of template help we've just developed,
so would you tell us please what you think of the new help

Move cursor on top of a Tab to open!