Product: LABEL MATRIX
Version: All Versions
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1. First, you will need to open your LABEL MATRIX program and navigate to the upper-left hand corner and select the Text Object creation button as seen below;
2. Once you've selected this button, a window will open with several tabs. On the Data tab you will see a drop down box with several options. You will want to select Counter. Your screen should look as it does below:
3. After you have selected your counter variable, you will need to add some data to this counter. In this next section let's start with the variable name, it is suggested to give it something relative to what it's counting.
The Start At: entry box is pretty straightforward, this is where your counter will begin and/or return to if you decide to have it reset after a parameter has been met. You may also pull the starting counter data from a database connection, located adjacent to the Start At: section.The Step By: entry box will be your trigger for when the counter should increase/decrease. If you wish data to appear prior to printing and counting, I suggest adding your starting information within the Sample: entry box as well. This will allow you to see the data in real time prior to the print job which can be very useful in Print Previews, which we will go over shortly. The counter data entry page will look as it does below;
4. Once you've completed this step, let's navigate to the Advanced Options within this page by clicking the Advanced button. This is where you can choose how many labels will print before the increment of the counter, a minimum/maximum value, and several options to help define how you'd like the counter to behave. The window you have open currently should look as you see in the example below;
5. Highlighted above are a few options as you can see denoted by the red boxes. If you do/do not want LABEL MATRIX to ask you if you wish to keep the changes that have taken place within the counter, then you can alter this here. The changes they imply, are changes such as printing 10 labels and wishing the counter to stay at 10 and not reset. Depending on how you're printing, you can choose how that counter increments, whether by Labels, Duplicates if you are printing via duplication/copy, and a few others which are variations on what I've described here. Now let's take a look at what we've created so far, your template should look similar to what is displayed below;
6. See the fixed text here to point out that this is a counter, and it will start at 1. If you'd like to confirm that you have created a counter, or wish to see what variables you have available, right-click on the label template itself and go to its properties, as seen below;
7. Once you've opened up the Label Properties, navigate to the Counter tab and you will see your newly created counter. See the provided example below;
8. Now let's test this counter to ensure that it's working properly. In the Menu Bar near the top of the program, select Print Preview and this will bring you to the Print Preview window. The button location is shown below;
9. After you've navigated to the Print Preview page, you can manipulate the label as if it's being printed. This is very helpful when testing counters. see the provided example of what your Print Preview window should look like;
10. As seen above, you can move forward with the arrows near the top of the page to simulate printing additional labels. When doing so, if you've created your counter correctly, it will increment by the desired amount in the fashion that you have chosen. You will notice something when getting to 9 labels, and that would be that it seems to automatically reset back to zero and then continue counting. This is a normal function, as we are only declaring a single digit counter currently. An example of the max counter range for a single digit counter is provided below:
When you reach a double digit, your counter will return to its starting point as seen here;
11. If you wish your counter to count multiple decimal places, you will need to set up your counter that way. Let's navigate back to the properties of the counter to find out how;
12. Select the Advanced.. tab and change the Maximum Value desire value.
13. Now that we've added a maximum value our counter, let's navigate back to the Print Preview page once more to see how it's going to increment. Once you've reached the maximum single digit value it will no longer return to zero and begin counting up. It should now appear as have shown below;
You have now successfully created a counter within LABEL MATRIX.
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