Printing Work Orders

This help file applies to an out-of-date version of MainBoss.
The most recent version of MainBoss is MainBoss 4.2.4.
For the latest version of this help file can be found here.

< Previous section | Table of Contents | Index | Next section >

You can print your current work orders by clicking the Print button in Work Orders or with Work Orders | Print. Both methods open a window that contains the following:

Sorting section: Options controlling how the report is organized.

Sort by list: These options determine how items are sorted. If you choose a Sort by option, you will be offered a second set of Sort by options which let you sort work orders within the initial sort criteria.

Sort Direction options: Determine whether the report is sorted from lowest values to highest or vice versa.

Filtering section: Options controlling what kind of work orders will be included in the report. The window lets you select work orders in several ways:

Show only active records: If this checkbox is checkmarked, the Active filter will automatically be applied when preparing the report; this means that information from old requests will not be included in the report. If this checkbox is blank, the Active filter is ignored; MainBoss uses information from all requests, no matter how old.

For more about the active filter, see The Active Filter.

Work Order Filters: Make selections based on properties of the work order. For example, if you filter by Requestor, you can restrict the print-out to work orders from a particular set of requestors (e.g. all work orders requested by a specified person).

Unit Filters: Make selections based on the unit involved in the work order. For example, if you filter by Unit Location, you can restrict the print-out to work orders on units at a particular location (e.g. all work orders in a specific building).

Unit Value Filters: Make selections based on properties of the unit involved in the work order. For example, if you filter by Purchase Vendor, you can restrict the print-out to work orders on units purchased from a particular vendor.

Advanced section: Miscellaneous options.

Suppress Costs: Omits any money information that might otherwise be displayed in the report.

Format Report in Columns: If this checkbox is checkmarked, the report will have information formatted in columns; this has the advantage of compressing a lot of information into a small amount of space, but may be difficult to read, especially if you ask for many pieces of information to be displayed. If the checkbox is blank, information will be laid out in a less rigid format.

Title: The title to be printed at the beginning of the report.

Font Size: The font size to be used for all standard characters in the print-out (i.e. anything that isn't a heading).

Main Font: The font that will be used for most of the characters in the report. This should be a font that is supported by both your Windows system and your printer.

Fixed-width Font: The font that will be used for information that is printed with fixed-width characters (mostly unit specifications). This should be a font that is supported by both your Windows system and your printer.

Bar Code Symbology: Specifies a format to be used for printing bar codes in this report. If you choose None, no bar codes will be printed; otherwise, a bar code containing the work order number will be printed for every work order in the report. For more information, see Bar Code Support.

Additional Labor/Material Lines: May be filled in with a number. If so, MainBoss will add that number of blank lines in the labor/material section of the work order. Workers can write in this blank area to record labor and/or materials not included in the original work report (e.g. materials you didn't expect to need).

Additional Information: Extra information to be printed in the work order. For example, you can use this area to specify that the work order should contain a signature line where customers can sign off once the job is finished.

You can set the default text for this additional information by using the Work Orders table viewer. Go to the Defaults for Work Order section and then to Printed Form.

Show checkboxes: A list of checkboxes that let you determine what information is displayed in the report. If a box is checkmarked, that type of information will be displayed; if a box is blank, that type of information will not be displayed.

Preview section: Displays a visual preview of the report. If you click the Preview button, you automatically go to this section.

The Preview section contains buttons for looking through the report preview and for actually printing the information. For more on using the Preview section, see Report Buttons.

Preview: Clicking this button generates a preview of the report, displayed in the Preview section of the window.

Print: Immediately prints the report.

Export Data: Exports the report's data in XML format.

Cancel: Cancels the preparation and printing of a report. This button is enabled only when MainBoss is preparing a report, i.e. gathering the data and formatting it. For more information, see Report Buttons.

Clear Select for Printing: If you click this button, MainBoss removes the checkmark from all Select for Printing boxes on all work orders. Typically, you do this after printing work orders that have been marked Select for Printing. For more, see Select For Printing.

Close: Closes the window.

For more on work orders, see Work Orders. For more on reports in general, see Reports.