report design

[Toxalot]

I'm trying to create a rather complicated report. I haven't worked
with reports much and I'm trying to understand when it is appropriate
to use subreports among other things. Let's see if I can explain this
clearly.

I have company information in one table and that displays as part of
the parent report. I have a one-to-many relationship between the
company and profile text. Here is a sample table structure.

lngCId
txtCName
....

lngCId
intTextLocation
txtProfile

Each profile text is to go in a specific spot on the report. So if I
have 3 text locations, should I be making 3 reports each with the one
field and put these as 3 subreports where I want them on the main
report? Or can I use the same report for the 3 subreports? If so, how
do I tell it which one to display based on intTextLocation?

Also, I have several different report styles with only minor
differences. Can I do some formatting on the fly so that I don't need
to create multiple reports?

Then on the same report I also have 4 contact people. Here is a sample
structure for the people table.

lngCId
intRoleId
txtRoleLabel
txtPerson

So, should I be using 4 subreports?

The people table does not include a record for all role ids if there
is no person in that position. If the position is empty, then the
report needs to show a default role label. I have a table with all the
default labels and they are different depending on the report style.
How would I go about showing the defaults when there is no person? Or
would it be better to add a record to the people table for all role
ids even if they don't have a person?

Jennifer