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Use

Start Page

Every form description consists of one or several draft pages. You create draft pages as directly inferior nodes of the root node Pages and Windows. The first inferior node of the root node is the start page, where the form processing starts.

Processing the Output Areas of a Page

SAP Smart Forms processes a draft page by processing all output areas of this page in the sequence determined in the navigation tree. Output areas in this case are the directly inferior nodes of the page node, that is, window nodes, graphic nodes, and address nodes with their own output area.

Ending the Processing of a Page

Processing of a draft page ends as soon as the processing of all output areas is finished:

  • For graphic and address nodes this means that the graphic or address was printed. If the output area was too small for the address, the remaining output is truncated on the print page.

  • For a secondary window, processing ends after all inferior nodes of this window have been processed. If the secondary window was too small, the remaining output is truncated on the print page.

  • For a main window, processing ends as soon as its output area is full. Unlike with the secondary window, its output is resumed on the next page.

Next Pages

There are two ways to specify the next page following the current page:

  • Use the Next page list box of the page node to enter the next draft page you want to process. A page that contains a main window can point to itself. If you specify nothing but the next page, SAP Smart Forms triggers an automatic page break as soon as the page is full. If the processing ends on this draft page, the next page set here it is not called.

  • Use a command node to insert a dynamic page break within a main window. As for any other node type, you can specify conditions to be fulfilled in order to trigger the manual page break. The page to which you branch using this method is called a dynamic next page.

Note the restrictions for using both manual page break and next page:

Use

On Page With Main Window

On Page Without Main Window

Dynamic page break using the command node

Allowed, but only within the main window

Not allowed

Specifying a next page in the page node

Mandatory

Optional

Specifying the current draft page as next page (page pointing to itself)

Allowed

Not allowed
Note

For a page without main window, never specify the same page as next page, because this would trigger an endless loop. In such a case, the system terminates processing after printing three pages.

Last Page

Form processing ends with the last page. The last page is reached if

  • on a draft page without main window no static next page is specified (for draft pages with main window, you must specify a static next page)

  • the draft page has a main window and

    • all inferior nodes of the main window have been processed and

    • no further manual page break has been processed in the main window.