Server Events and Client Scripts

ASP Report Maker now supports server events and client scripts. You can create your own functionality by writing your own customized server and client side codes. The customized codes are stored in your projects so you can migrate your project to other templates or future versions easily. This feature reduces the need of template customization and create maximum possibilities for you to customize and create more advanced features for your projects.

The steps to create the server events and client scripts are as follows:

After loading the database, the database objects (tables, views, custom views and reports) will be shown in the left pane (the database pane). Click on any table to go to the Field Setup Page and the Server Events and Client Scripts page at any time.

Note: For simplicity, we use "table" in the following description to refer to any of database object in the project. A database object can be either a table, a view, a custom view or a report.


The treeview shows the available server events and client scripts that you can add to your project:

Server Events Server-side VBScript procedures

Global

 The events are applicable to all ASP pages

Table-Specific

 The set of events are table-specific, the events are applicable to the selected table only

Other

 The events are applicable to some common pages in the project only
Client Scripts Client-side JavaScript

Global

 The JavaScript are included in all pages with header and footer

Table-Specific

 The JavaScript are table-specific, they are included to pages for the selected table only

Other

 The JavaScript are included in some common pages in the project only

To add your custom scripts to the server events or client scripts, select an item in the treeview, then enter your code in the editor.

The editor supports Find and Replace. Press Ctrl-F to open the Find dialog and press Ctrl-H to open the Replace dialog.

You can click the [Reset] button to discard the existing code and reload template code for the server event or client script.

 

Code Repository

ASP Report Maker now provides a Code Repository for easy reuse of your code across projects and sharing with other users. Click the [Code Repository] button to open it, categorized reusable code will be displayed:

You can add the code to the editor by clicking the [Add to Editor] button, or by double-clicking the item, or simply drag the item to the editor. The reusable code is stored in XML files which reside in s subfolder name "code" under the installation folder. The format of the XML files is simple, there are 3 parts:

  1. description - description of the reusable code
  2. code - code to be inserted to editor
  3. globalcode - common code to be inserted to Global Code (see below), this code will only be inserted once into the project. For example , if your code is used several times in your project and your code calls a helper function, it is unnecessary to include the helper function several times. In this case you put your helper function in the globalcode section, then the function will only be included one time.

There are a few example files in the "code" folder, you can copy and modify for your own code and then save them under the "code" folder for reuse.

 

Server Events

In general, server events are fired in the following order:

Page_Load (Table-Specific/Other, a page class member) -> Row_* (Table-Specific, a table class member) -> Page_Unload (Table-Specific/Other, a page class member)

Available server events are:

Global -> All Pages

Page_Head

The code you entered in this event will be placed in the header.asp before closing the <head> section. You can use this event to can add your code in head section.

Example

Include custom JavaScript and CSS styesheet.

ewrpt_AddClientScript("xxx.js") ' Add JavaScript
ewrpt_AddStylesheet("xxx.css") ' Add CSS stylesheet

Database_Connecting

This event will be fired by all ASP pages before connecting to the database. Note: This is a global function.

The argument is the connection string for ADO. You can use this event to change the connection string (e.g. changing connection info with server, or even connect to other databases).

Example

Sub Database_Connecting(Connstr)
    'Respone.Write(Connstr)
    If Request.ServerVariables("REMOTE_ADDR") = "127.0.0.1" Then ' Testing on local PC
        Connstr = "Provider=Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0;Data Source=" & Server.MapPath("xxx.mdb") & ";"
    End If
End Sub

Database_Connected

This event will be fired by all ASP pages after connecting to the database. Note: This is a global function.

The argument is the connection object, you can use it to execute your own statements.

Example

Call a stored procedure after connection.

Sub Database_Connected(conn)
    conn.Execute("My SQL")
End Sub

Page_Loading

This event will be called by all ASP pages at the beginning of the page. If the pages involves database connection, it will be called after connecting to the database and before the Page_Load event. Note: This is a global function.

Page_Unloaded

 This event will be called by all ASP pages at the end of the page. If the pages involves database connection, it will be called before closing database connection and after the Page_UnLoad event. Note: This is a global function.

Global Code

Code to be included in all ASP pages. This may contain your constants, variables and functions.

User_CustomValidate

For use with security. (See Security Settings) This event is fired before default user validation. You can use this event to validate the user yourself. The arguments are the user name and password the user entered. Note: This event is a security class member.

Note: This event is not fired for the hard-coded administrator.

Example

Login user by Windows user name. Note that in this simple example, Advanced Security is not used so you can return TRUE to skip default validation. If you use Advanced Security, you still need the user information such as User ID and User Level. The user table is still required to store user information, although the password field is unnecessary. And you need to return FALSE to continue with default validation.

' Note: This event is a Security class member, so you can refer to other members of the Security class directly
Function User_CustomValidate(usr, pwd)
    ' e.g. Simple Windows authentication
    If Request.ServerVariables("LOGON_USER") <> "" Then
        usr = Request.ServerVariables("LOGON_USER")
        User_CustomValidate = True ' In this example, no Advanced Security, skip default validation
    Else
         User_CustomValidate = False ' Return False to continue with default validation after event exits
     End If
End Function

User_Validated

For use with security. (See Security Settings) This event is fired after successful user login. The user info is passed to the event as an ADO recordset (see note), you can get more info of the user and use it as you need. Note: This event is a security class member.

Notes:

  1. This event is not fired for the hard-coded administrator.

  2. The argument is an ADO recordset, you can get a field vaue by rs("<fieldname>").

Example

Add current user's country to session variable

' Note: This event is a Security class member, so you can refer to other members of the Security class directly
Sub User_Validated(rs) {
    Session("UserCountry") = rs("Country")
End Sub

UserLevel_Loaded

For use with User Level security. (See Security Settings) This event is fired after successful user login and after the User Level settings are loaded. It is possible to do actions such as changing or adding User Level permissions. Note: This event is a security class member.

Example

Change the permissions of an User Level for a table

' Note: This event is a Security class member, so you can refer to other members of the Security class directly
Sub UserLevel_Loaded()
    DeleteUserPermission "Sales", "orders", EW_ALLOW_ADD
    AddUserPermission "Sales", "orders", EW_ALLOW_EDIT
End Sub

UserID_Loading

For use with User ID security. (See Security Settings) This event is fired after successful user login and before loading the User ID and its child User IDs of the current user. These User IDs determine which records the current user can access. It is possible to do actions such as changing the User ID of the current user so the user can access records that he/she can access by its original User ID. Note: This event is a security class member.

Example

Change the user's User ID to his parent user's user ID and let the user access more records (accessible by the parent user).

' Note: This event is a Security class member, so you can refer to other members of the Security class directly
Sub UserID_Loading()
    If CurrentParentUserID() <> "" Then
        CurrentUserID = CurrentParentUserID()
    End If
End Sub

UserID_Loaded

For use with User ID security. (See Security Settings) This event is fired after loading the User ID and its child User IDs of the current user. These User IDs determine which records the current user can access. It is possible to do actions such as adding or deleting the loaded User IDs for the current user so the user can access more or less records that he/she can access by its originally loaded User IDs. Note: This event is a security class member.

Example

Add more User IDs to the user and let the user access more records

' Note: This event is a Security class member, so you can refer to other members of the Security class directly
Sub UserID_Loaded()
    If CurrentUserName() = "nancy" Then
        AddUserID GetUserIDByUserName("janet")
    End If
End Sub

Menu_Rendering

This event is fired before the menu is rendered. You can manipulate the menu items in this event. The argument is the menu object. (See Menu Object belwo.) Note: This is a global function.

Example 1

Add an additional menu item to the menu for logged in users only.

Sub Menu_Rendering(Menu)
    If Menu.IsRoot Then ' Root menu
        Menu.AddMenuItem 10000, "MyMenuText", "MyPage.asp", -1, "", IsLoggedIn()
    End If
End Sub

Example 2

Remove all the default menu items and use your own menu items.

Sub Menu_Rendering(Menu)
    If Menu.IsRoot Then ' Root menu
        Menu.Clear()
        Menu.AddMenuItem 1, "MyMenuText1", "MyPage1.asp", -1, "", "", True, False
        Menu.AddMenuItem 2, "MyMenuText2", "MyPage2.asp", -1, "", "", True, False
    End If
End Sub

MenuItem_Adding

This event is fired for custom menu items before it is added to the menu. The menu item info is passed to the event as an instance of the crMenuItem object, refer to the generated ewrfn*.asp for members of the object. Return False if you don't want to show the menu item. Note: This is a global function.

Example

Only show a menu item after the user has logged in

Function MenuItem_Adding(Item)
    ' Return False if menu item not allowed
    If Item.Text = "Download" Then
        MenuItem_Adding = Security.IsLoggedIn()
    Else
        MenuItem_Adding = True
    End If
End Sub

Note: If you integrate with ASPMaker, since the menu items are imported to the ASPMaker project, you should use the MenuItem_Adding server event in the ASPMaker project.
Table-Specific -> Report Page

Page_Load

 This event will be called after connecting to the database.

Page_Unload

 This event will be called before closing database connection.

Filters_Load

This event allows you to add custom filter to the popup filter of the fields. (Previously named as CustomFilter_Load.)

Note: This event is a table class member, so you can refer to the fields using <field>.

Example

Add 'StartsWithA' filter to a string field. You can use the ewrpt_RegisterCustomFilter() function to add your custom filter, the parameters of the function are:

  • fld - the field object
  • FilterName - the filter name
  • DisplayName - the display name of the filter to be displayed in the popup filter
  • FunctionName - the ASP function to be called for building the WHERE clause. The function must have one and only one parameter which is the field expression to be used in the WHERE clause. You can put the function in Global Code. (Note: The following example function is already in the template, do not put it in the Global Code again.)

Function GetStartsWithAFilter(FldExpression)
    GetStartsWithAFilter = FldExpression & " LIKE 'A%'"
End Function

Then you can enter event code as below:

Sub Filters_Load()
    ewrpt_RegisterCustomFilter MyStringField, "StartsWithA", "Starts With A", "GetStartsWithAFilter" ' Register your custom filter
    ewrpt_UnregisterCustomFilter MyDateField, "LastTwoWeeks" ' Unregister the built-in filter "Last two weeks"
End Sub

 

Page_FilterValidated

This event will be called after the search criteria is assigned to the field objects. You can modify the search criteria in this event.

This event is a member of the table class. There is no arguments for this event. To change the search criteria, change the SearchValue, SearchOperator, SearchCondition, SearchValue2, SearchOperator2 property of the field object.

Page_DataRendering

This event will be called before report rendering. You can use this event to add HTML above the report. The parameter is:

header - set your HTML to this parameter.

Note: This event is a page class member.

Page_DataRendered

This event will be called after report rendering. You can use this event to add HTML below the report. The parameter is:

footer - set your HTML to this parameter.

Note: This event is a page class member.

Row_Rendering

 This event will be called before rendering (e.g. applying the View Tag settings) a record. Note: This event is a table class member.

Row_Rendered

This event will be called after rendering a record.

This is an extremely useful event for conditional formatting, you can do a lot of things with this event, such as changing font color, font styles, row background color, cell background color, etc. by changing the table or field class properties in the event according to field values.

The table class has a RowAttrs property which is an object of HTML attributes for the table row. The field class has CellAttrs, ViewAttrs for the table cell and View Tag of the field respectively. The keys of the attributes must be valid HTML attributes for the HTML tag, always use lowercase for the keys. The attribute values will be outputted as double quoted attributes, so if you have double quotes in your values, try to use single quotes if possible, or use "&quot;".

Note: This event is a table class member, so you can refer to the fields using <field>.

To view the properties of the field class for development or debugging, you can use the write them in the server event, e.g.

Response.Write RowAttributes()
Response.Write Trademark.CellAttributes()
Response.Write Trademark.ViewAttributes()

Example

Click "Cars" node on the database panel, select [Server Events/Client Scripts], and click [Table Specific] - > [Common] - > [Row_Rendered] server event. The default Row_Rendered event code is shown. Change as follow:

Sub Row_Rendered()
    ' Change the row color
    If Trademark.ViewValue = "BMW" Then
        RowAttrs.Append "style", "color: red; background-color: #ccffcc"
    End If

    ' Change the cell color
    If Cyl.CurrentValue = 4 Then
        Cyl.CellAttrs.Append "style", "background-color: #ffcccc"
    ElseIf Cyl.CurrentValue = 6 Then
        Cyl.CellAttrs.Append "style", "background-color: #ffcc99"
    ElseIf Cyl.CurrentValue = 8 Then
        Cyl.CellAttrs.Append "style", "background-color: #ffccff"
    End If

    ' Change text style
    If Category.CurrentValue = "SPORTS" Then
        Category.ViewAttrs.Append "style", "color: #00cc00; font-weight: bold; background-color: #ffff99"
    End If

End Sub

Cell_Rendered

This event will be called after rendering a cell.

Note: This event is fired before Row_Rendered event, if you set the same setting in the Row_Rendered event, it will be overwritten by the Row_Rendered event.

This is another extremely useful event for conditional formatting. It is especially useful for the dynamic columns for Crosstab reports as there are many dynamic columns for the same Column Field in the report. This event saves you from accessing the arrays for the columns, you can get/set the values passed to the event as arguments directly. The arguments are:

Field - the field object
CurrentValue - current value of the cell (unformatted)
ViewValue - view value of the cell (formatted)
ViewAttrs - assocative array of the View Tag attributes
CellAttrs - assocative array of the table cell attributes
HrefValue - href attribute if the hyperlink for the view value of the cell

The keys of the CellAttrs and ViewAttrs arrays must be valid HTML attributes for the HTML tag, always use lowercase for the keys. The attribute values will be outputted as double quoted attributes, so if you have double quotes in your values, try to use single quotes if possible, or use "&quot;".

Note: This event is a table class member, so you can refer to the fields using $this-><field>.

Example

Click "Cars" node on the database panel, select [Server Events/Client Scripts], and click [Table Specific] - > [Common] - > [Row_Rendered] server event. The default Row_Rendered event code is shown. Change as follow:

Sub Cell_Rendered(Field, CurrentValue, ViewValue, ViewAttrs, CellAttrs, HrefValue)

    ' Change the cell color for the Cyl field
    If Field.FldName = "Cyl" Then
        If CurrentValue = 4 Then
            CellAttrs.Append "style", "background-color: #ffcccc"
        ElseIf CurrentValue = 6 Then
            CellAttrs.Append "style", "background-color: #ffcc99"
        ElseIf CurrentValue = 8 Then
            CellAttrs.Append "style", "background-color: #ffccff"
        End If
    End If
End Sub

 

Chart_Rendering

 This event is fired before the chart XML is built. You can still change the chart properties using this event, the parameters is:

chart - the chart object instance which contain all the information about the chart to be rendered. It is an instance of the crChart class, refer to ewrfn*.asp for members of the object.

Chart_Rendered

 This event is fired after the chart XML is built and before the XML is outputted. You can still modify the XML using this event, the parameters is:

chart - the chart object instance which contain all the information about the chart to be rendered. It is an instance of the crChart class, refer to ewrfn*.asp for members of the object. This parameter is read-only.

chartxml - the XML (string) to be outputted. You can load it to an XML document object and modify it by MSXML functions, or you can directly manipulate it by string functions.

Example

Set chart subcaption by code

Sub Chart_Rendered(chart, chartxml)
    Dim doc
    Set doc = chart.XmlDoc ' Get the MSXML object
    doc.DocumentElement.SetAttribute "subCaption", "My SubCaption"
    chartxml = doc.XML ' Output the XML
End Sub

Email_Sending

This event is fired before the email is sent. You can customize the email content using this event. Email_Sending event has the following parameters:

Email - the email object instance which contain all the information about the email to be sent. It is an instance of the crEmail class, refer to ewrfn*.asp for members of the object.

Args - an array which contains additional information. By default it is empty.

Return False in the event if you want to cancel the email sending.

Note: This event is a table class member.

Example

Use a field value of the the new record in the email

Function Email_Sending(Email, Args)
    Email.Content = Email.Content & vbCrLf & "Sent by " & CurrentUserName()
    Email_Sending = TRUE
End Function


Message_Showing

 Use this event to change the error message to be displayed in the page.

Form_CustomValidate

This event is fired after the normal form validation. You can use this event to do your own custom validation. In general, the form data can be accessed by <Table>.<Field>.FormValue (e.g. Cars.HP.FormValue). Refer to the generated code for actual variable names.

A parameter CustomError is passed to the event, add your error message and return False if the form values do not pass your validation.

Note: This event is a page class member.

Example

Make sure an integer field value meet a certain requirement

Function Form_CustomValidate(CustomError)
    If Int(Orders.Qty.FormValue) Mod 10 <> 0 Then
        ' Return error message in CustomError
        CustomError = "Quantity must be multiples of 10."
        Form_CustomValidate = FALSE
    Else         
        Form_CustomValidate = TRUE
    End If    
End Function
Other -> Login Page

Page_Load

 This event will be called at the beginning of the page.

Page_Unload

 This event will be called at the end of the page.

Message_Showing

 Use this event to change the error message to be displayed in the page.

Form_CustomValidate

This event is fired after the normal form validation. You can use this event to do your own custom validation.

A parameter CustomError is passed to the event, add your error message and return False if the form values do not pass your validation.

Note: This event is a page class member.

Other -> Logout Page

Page_Load

 This event will be called at the beginning of the page.

Page_Unload

 This event will be called at the end of the page.

 

Client Scripts

In general, each page has two blocks of JavaScripts:

Client Script - the first block of JavaScript to be included at the beginning of the page, you can put your JavaScript variables and functions there. The View Tag (for display) and Edit Tag (for input) of the fields supports Custom Attributes (See Field Setup) so you can add your own attributes to work with your own JavaScript included here.

Startup Script - the second block of JavaScript to be included at the end of the page, you can put code here to "start up" your JavaScript.

Global -> Pages with header/footer

Client Script

The script will be placed in the header and therefore included in all pages with header.

Startup Script

 The script will be placed in the footer and therefore included in all pages with footer.

Global Code

JavaScript code to be included in all pages with header. This may contain your global constants, variables and functions.
Table-Specific -> Report Page

Client Script

 The script will be placed after the header.

Startup Script

 The script will be placed before the footer.

Form_CustomValidate

This function is called after the normal form validation. You can use this event to do your own custom validation. The form object can be accessed by the parameter fobj. In general, the field can be referred to as fobj.elements["x_FieldName"]. (The element names have different names in Inline/Grid Add/Edit of List page, always refer to the generated code for the actual form element names.) Return False if the form values do not pass your validation.

Note: This function is a member of the JavaScript page class.

Example

Make sure an integer field value meet a certain requirement

function(fobj) { // DO NOT CHANGE THIS LINE!
    var qty = parseInt(fobj.elements["x_Qty"].value);
    if (qty % 10 != 0) {         
        return ew_OnError(this, fobj.elements["x_Qty"], "Order quantity must be multiples of 10."); // return false if invalid
    }
    return true;
}

Chart_Rendering

This event is fired when the JavaScript chart object has finished loading the XML data and before rendering.

The event arguments are :

chart - This JavaScript chart object

chartid - This ID of the chart

Chart_Rendered

This event is raised when the JavaScript chart object has finished rendering. This call is made only once per loaded chart SWF (even if new data is supplied to it).  It can be used to invoke any further JavaScript methods on chart.

The event arguments are :

chart - This JavaScript chart object

chartid - This ID of the chart
Other -> Login Page

Client Script

 The script will be placed after the header.

Startup Script

 The script will be placed before the footer.

Form_CustomValidate

This function is called after the normal form validation. You can use this event to do your own custom validation. The form object can be accessed by the parameter fobj. Return False if the form values do not pass your validation.

Note: It is recommended that you develop your server event and client scripts in the generated script so you can edit and test it immediately. When you finish your custom script, copy it to ASP Report Maker custom script editor and save it.

 

Objects in ASP Report Maker Generated Code

The following objects are available in the generated code and you can use them in the Server Events to add more power to the code. The most important objects are:

Page Object
The Page object is generated for most pages. You can access the object properties using the -> notation (e.g. Page.PageID). The methods and properties of the page class varies with page, for the complete list of methods and properties, please refer to the generated class "cr<Table>_<PageID>" (e.g. crCars_rpt) in the generated scripts.

Table Object
A cr<Table> Class is generated for each table and the <Table> object is instantiated for all table level pages. For example, the "crCars" class is generated for the "Cars" table and is instantiated as the "Cars" object. You can access the object properties using the -> notation (e.g. Cars.xxx). For the complete list of methods and properties, please refer to the class "cr<Table>" in the generated file.

Field Object
A <Field> object is generated for each field in a table. For example, the "Trademark" object is generated for the "Trademark" field in the "Cars" table. You can access the object properties using the -> notation (e.g. Cars.Trademark.CurrentValue). For the complete list of methods and properties, please refer to the class "crField" in the generated file "ewrfn*.asp".

Chart Object
A <Chart> object is generated for each chart in a table. For example, the "Chart1" object is generated for the chart named "Chart1" for the table. You can access the object properties using the -> notation (e.g. Report1.Chart1). For the complete list of methods and properties, please refer to the class "crChart" in the generated file "ewrfn*.asp".

Security Object
The Security object is used to store the current Advanced Security settings. Please refer to the class "crAdvancedSecurity" in the generated file "ewrfn*.asp" for the complete list of methods and properties.

Email Object
The Email object contains the required information of the email to be sent, the instance of the object will be passed to the Email_Sending events as argument and let you modify the email. Please refer to the class "crEmail" in the generated file "ewrfn*.asp" for the complete list of methods and properties.

Menu Object
The Menu object contains all information of a menu, the instance of the menu will be passed to the Menu_Rendering events as argument and let you work with the menu. Please refer to the class "crMenu" in the generated file "ewrfn*.asp" for the complete list of methods and properties.

MenuItem Object
The MenuItem object contains all information of the menu item, the instance of the menu item will be passed to the MenuItem_Adding events as argument and let you work with the menu item. Please refer to the class "crMenuItem" in the generated file "ewrfn*.asp" for the complete list of methods and properties.

ListOpions Object
The ListOptions object contains all information of the export links in the report page. Please refer to the class "crListOptions" in the generated file "ewrfn*.asp" for the complete list of methods and properties.

Language Object
The language Object lets you retrieve a phrase of the active language during runtime. The phrase can be retrieved in the generated scripts using methods such as Phrase, TablePhrase and FieldPhrase. Please refer to the class "crLanguage" in the generated file "ewrfn*.asp" for the complete list of methods and properties.

There are a few other objects in the generated code, please refer to the source code of the file "ewrfn*.asp" in the generated scripts.

 

Some Global Functions

The following are some useful global function available in the generated code for you to get information easier in server events:

Function name Arguments Description Example
CurrentUserName - Get current user name. username = CurrentUserName()
CurrentUserID - For used with User ID Security (see Security Settings). Get current User ID. userid = CurrentUserID()
CurrentUserLevel - For used with User Level Security (see Security Settings). Get current user's User Level ID (integer). levelid = CurrentUserLevel()
CurrentUserInfo fieldname For used with Advanced Security (see Security Settings). Get current user's info from the user table. The argument is the field name in the user table. email = CurrentUserInfo("email")
CurrentPageID - Get current page ID. A page ID identifies the page type, it can be "rpt", "summary", "crosstab", etc.

If CurrentPageID() = "crosstab" Then
    ...your code...
End If
CurrentPage - Get current page object.

Set page = CurrentPage
CurrentTable - Get current table object.

Set table = CurrentTable
IsLoggedIn - For used with Advanced Security (see Security Settings). Get the login status of the current user. If IsLoggedIn() Then
    ...your code...
End If

There are many other functions in the generated code, please refer to the source code of the file "ewrfn*.asp" in template or generated scripts.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 
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