Analysis of Report Formatting Statements
To determine default values, Report-Writer analyzes the formatting statements in reverse hierarchical order, from the innermost (detail level) statements to the outermost (report level) statements, as shown below:
1. .detail section statements
2. .footer statements for innermost sort column
3. .header section for innermost sort column
4. .footer and .header sections for the next to the last sort column, and so on
5. .footer and .header text for the page
6. .footer and .header text for the report
By analyzing the report code in this way, Report-Writer attempts to determine the innermost references to columns in the report, and to determine the leftmost and rightmost print positions indicated by the specified report formatting statements.