Print List of Absentees

[eean]

Hi,

So I thought this should be easy.

 

We're on SIMS 7.120.

 

I want a printed report that looks like this:

Reception

Class1

List of children not here today

Name & Reason Code

Class2

List of children not here today

Name & Reason Code

 

---New Page---

Year 1

Class3

List of children not here today

Name & Reason Code

Class4

List of children not here today

Name & Reason Code

 

--New Page---

 

For each year group upto year 6. (We're split site so I don't want secondary).

I want the secretary to be able to hit a button at 8am and it will print the list. We'll use the list in the event of a fire and also for various other reasons when we want to see who's not here today.

 

Where do I even start?

 

I can't even manage to make it print out a list of children not here today!

 

Argh!!

 

Any help in getting to this, or even close to this, will be greatfully recieved!

Edited May 7, 2010 by eean
Forgot to say I which MIS I was using.

[powdarrmonkey]

Knowing which MIS you want this from would be a helpful start...

[eean]

Sorry!

 

We're on SIMS 7.120

 

Thanks

[Sivadam]

Reports, Lesson Monitor (or Attendance), Selected Students Reports, Sessions Absence Report. Edit the date range (just for today if you wish!). Select Reg Groups. Search. Select All, Print.

It's near enough to what you want!

Edited May 7, 2010 by Sivadam

[eean]

Thanks for that.

The only problem is it sorts the children by name. It would be easier/better if they were sorted by class then by name.

 

Also, in order to get just one year group on a sheet, we have to run the report 7 times - each time for each year group, which is a bit of a pain. And you need to select the date - it's a bit of a faff and quite easy to select the wrong date.

 

Is there a way to automate this task and/or provide a custom layout?

[Sivadam]

Thanks for that.

The only problem is it sorts the children by name. It would be easier/better if they were sorted by class then by name.

 

The report I refer to IS in Reg Groups! At least it is from Lesson Monitor. I would have assumed it was the same from Attendance!

[eean]

That's wierd. I've done it from Lesson Monitor. I select Year 3 and it just gives me a list of names, sorted by surname. Which is sort of what I want, but I'd prefer it to be sub-divided by class.

[Sivadam]

That's wierd. I've done it from Lesson Monitor. I select Year 3 and it just gives me a list of names, sorted by surname. Which is sort of what I want, but I'd prefer it to be sub-divided by class.

You need to select Reg Groups - not Years!

[eean]

That means we've got to print out 1 A4 page per class. We might as well print out the complete register! Also, with 36 classes, it'll be lunchtime by the time she gets them all finished!

[Sivadam]

That means we've got to print out 1 A4 page per class. We might as well print out the complete register! Also, with 36 classes, it'll be lunchtime by the time she gets them all finished!

If you select 'ALL' and then 'Print' then they all print out one after the other!

You could also just select the groups for one year group if that is what you want.

If there is a reasonable printer attached then this does not take that long!

The report is extremely flexible which means that schools can use it it in whichever way they want! The facility to add other details is also helpful!

 

You can add your own format though I have never tried this!

Edited May 10, 2010 by Sivadam

[eean]

It was more that we didn't like the idea of printing out 36 pages every day. 7 being less bad.

Save the planet and all that!

 

Thanks for the tip with the multiple selection.

[vikpaw]

That means we've got to print out 1 A4 page per class. We might as well print out the complete register! Also, with 36 classes, it'll be lunchtime by the time she gets them all finished!

 

you could print out the entire register, and at the click of a few buttons, Today's register report would do that. but even for this report we are discussing, you should be able to run them all together, and they will page break, so you can send all at once. it shouldnt take hours!

 

you can get closer to what you want by designing your own report if you wish.

 

try something along these lines shown in pics:

 

 

 

[eean]

Magic. That's exactly what I was trying to do for 2 hours but couldn't quite figure it out. I will try it tomorrow.

 

Cheers,

[vikpaw]

ok, welcome

 

give it a go yourself as it's good to play around with the reports system, especially the sub query on attendance marks, choose to get it to prompt at run time.

you may find you want to alter things slightly, depending on the output.

 

i found it looked odd, as our reg names can be large, and the default template just throws the data out in rows, without a heading or anything for class, as in your example. a custom template could be made though to give better layout.

 

worst case, if you get really stuck, i can export the report for you.

[eean]

OK. After half a morning of faffing about I have a query that does what I want:

Year, Reg, Surname, Forename, Reason Code

Giving me only the absent children.

 

If I do the standard template RTF output I can put each year on it's own sheet. But, as you say, the output isn't ideal.

 

Ideally I'd like a sheet per year group. With a subheading and table for each class. If you do a custom report then the page breaks option seems to get ignored. If you create your own table then you can't seem to use the command.

 

I see in the reference that there is a command. But this document says

Used to group the report. A further help sheet will be produced in the future to

cover its use in more detail.

 

Any idea how to use this command or the whereabouts of said help sheet?

 

Thanks for your help.

[vikpaw]

Sorry for the delayed response, i have had it working before, so will take a look for you.

 

Only just upgraded to Office 2007, so some things not quite working right, and about to test office 2010, which is way cooler )

Also my machine is getting hammered at the moment so need to reboot, and will be off until sat, so will take a look then.

 

I think though with the Group By option, you have to sort on the column you want to group by, and have it in a particular position. Also you have to get the name of the field exactly right, Caps and all. I can't remember if the little name that the column gets given in the field list is always the correct one. I've got a report that groups by the Reg column, labelled as Reg, but my template still says "GROUP BY Reg group" so it can be trial and error with those.

[vikpaw]

I've been trying this out, but all weekend couldn't get my machine / SIMS to play ball. i needed to clear some disk space before the report would even run. i've now got it running and trying to play with user defined rtf. and now i know why i hate them so much. it takes ages to sort things, and get the rows in the table to appear. it's such a pain.

i'm still messing around, but in case you can get better luck try putting the following at the top and various combinations:

 

 

This works in another report of mine, which has reg group as the main sort field.

 

The column is labelled Reg automatically, but putting in RegGroup is what allows the auto page breaking. Incidentally, this is how it is coded in the little pagebreak window that lets you click on a field if using a standard template...

 

The template where i do have it working doesn't even use the record start / record end markers, which help with the layout, but i can't repeat that at the moment.

 

Hope that helps. I'll have another bash tomorrow, as it's good testing to see what i can do with Office 2007