Another Access 2007 Issue - Default grouping of objects on report and how the heck do you ungroup?
November 18th, 2008Created a default report (I hate the lack of control you have on default reports! Where are my old wizards that I’ve loved over the past 10 years? Arrrggghhhh!!!!!). Then started to modify the controls that were pre-populated on the screen. Started by deleting undesirable controls. All the controls to the right slid to the right! Why the heck did this happen? Not sure I like that. What if I were reserving the deleted space for something else (which I was)? Frustrating but let’s move on…
So I copied / pasted a label and text box (choosing both like a good little Access developer) and WhamO! New controls just pasted are under the old controls! Header & Detail section has bee expanded to accomodate. Now I’ve got to move the new label individually, then the new control individually, then resize the header then resize the detail. What a pain! I realize the old way was flawed (pasting directly on top of the copied controls), but why this new solution of copying below? How about still on top but slightly to the right to indicated the new controls are ’slightly’ on top of the old? How much more convenient would that be!!!!!! But wait, it gets worse…
Now I can’t even move my new controls! There some sort of grouping issue going on so I need to ungroup. Oh Lord! I feel a headache coming on ’cause I’m sure they’ve moved the grouping/ungrouping process. Sure enough, 5 minutes of searching reveals nothing (Another 5 minutes of my life gone done the tubes due to Access 2007. Arrrggghhhh!!!!!! What idiot at Microsoft has done this to us!)
So I get one of my other developers to come over and help. Apparently she’s encountered this frustration previously and knows how to solve. She right clicks the grouped controls scrolls down to Layout and chooses ‘Remove’. That’s not intuitive, now is it? How about giving us a choice to ‘Remove Grouping’? would that be so difficult? Idiocy!!!!!!!