Printing

There are several formats for printing the spreadsheet data from Spec, ranging from simply printing the spreadsheet view as seen on the screen, to internal reports, to custom formatted documents that can display your company's branding standards. 

Print

To print one of the report formats from Print Templates, click the Print tool on the Print tab. 

This will first provide the Record Filtering dialog to allow for the selection of a range of records. Once the range is selected, click Next. Click Cancel to close the dialog without proceeding or Help to navigate to the Spec section on the Help Center. 

After clicking Next, the Report Templates dialog will show on the Default Template tab. This displays the template files located in the ProjectSpec folder under Print Templates.

Select a Template Name on the left side panel. A Template can contain one or many reports. 

Click on a Report Name in the next panel to make a selection and see the preview on the right. This preview will contain the first 25 rows of records. 

Additional actions are provided along the bottom of the window. 

Save As Default - Saves the selected Template file in the default folder for Print Templates in the ProjectSpec folder.

Edit - Opens the selected report in the Print Template editor.

Preview - Opens the full Print Preview window.

Print - Opens the Print dialog to select a printer and print.

Close - Closes the dialog without printing.

The User's Template tab displays a user's custom reports that may be saved in other folder locations. Click Open Template to browse and select the template file. Right click to Delete a selected file from the User list. 

The Recent Report tab displays recently used reports. 

Print Preview

Click the Print Preview icon on the Print tab to see a preview of the template report to be printed. 

The Preview Template window will provide a drop-down list of all the available reports from the last used Print Template along with various tools to view and navigate the preview. 

Some key tools include: 

Print - Opens the Print dialog to select a printer and print.

Export - Opens a File Explorer to save the report as a PDF or other file type.

Thumbnails - Displays all the report pages by Thumbnails for a quick overview. Click the icon again to return to the individual page view.

Close Preview - Closes the Preview Template window without printing.

Template Editor

See the Print Template section of the Help Center for full details on creating custom Print Templates.

Spreadsheet Print

Click the Spreadsheet Print icon on the Print tab to open the Print dialog to select a printer and print the spreadsheet view as seen on the screen. All record lines will be included, regardless of any current Filters applied. 

The spreadsheet will format to the width of the selected page settings. Consider using the Spreadsheet Print Built In View Template which uses less columns to adjust the width of the data to be printed or create your own. 

Additional information is included in the header and footer of the page. 

1. Project Title as entered on the Project Info tab. 

2. Pricing totals as seen on the bottom left of the Spec window. To hide any or all of these values, navigate to the Tools tab and click the Settings icon. On the Price Information tab, check the boxes for the values to hide. 

   

3. File location.

Spreadsheet Print Preview 

Click the Speadsheet Print Preview icon on the Print tab to preview the Spreadsheet Print and adjust the page setup before printing. Various tools are provided along the top of the window to view and navigate the preview. 

Some key tools include:

Save - Opens the File Explorer to save the document as a PDF or other file type.

Page Setup - Opens the Page Setup dialog to adjust the page size, orientation, and margins. 

Print - Opens the Print dialog to select the printer and print.

Reflow - Rearranges the text into a single column to fit the screen width.

Reporting

Several reports are available for printing on the Reporting tab of the main Spec view. These range from cut sheets, to financial summaries, to part details. 

Select the report to view from the drop-down list. Along with various tools to navigate the report preview, the following tools can be found on the right side of the Reporting ribbon. 

Print - Opens the Print dialog to select the printer and print.

Filter Print - Opens a Record Filtering dialog to select a range of records to print in the selected report.

Export - Opens a File Explorer to save the report as a PDF or other file type.

Find Text - Opens a Find bar at the bottom left of the Reporting tab to find specific text.

Expand the Ribbon (down arrow) - Expands the ribbon for a view of the full set of viewing and navigation tools. Click the up arrow to collapse the ribbon.

Additional view tools are provided on the bottom right of the Reporting tab to rotate the view, view as multiple pages, or zoom. 

Exporting

A project can be exported from Spec in various SIF or other file formats. Click the File menu and hover over Export to see the full list. 

PMX File - This is the Spec file format that will contain information specific to the Spec program tools and features in addition to the part and project information. 

Standard SIF - This is the standard industry SIF format. 

Manufacturer Specific - Some manufacturers provide their own SIF formats for transferring data. If your manufacturer has a specific SIF format, use that specific export first.

Custom SIF - If a custom format is required to capture or export information in a certain way, a Custom SIF can be created with the assistance of a Configura Support Specialist. 

Microsoft Excel - This is the .xls format for the Excel program and will contain the columns as seen on the current spreadsheet view. 

CSV File - This is the comma-separated values as plain text to be used in any spreadsheet program.

Text File - This is a raw text format. 

OFDA XML - This is the Office Furniture Dealers Alliance Extensible Markup Language standard format for the commercial furniture industry. 

After clicking to select the file format, a Record Filtering dialog is provided to select the range of records to be included in the export. 

Export As - Displays the file location and name of the file being exported. All exported files will display the file name and "(exported)" by default to distinguish them from the automatic exports. 

Browse - Opens the File Explorer to change the location and/or name of the file.

OK - Exports the file.

Cancel - Closes the dialog without exporting any information.