MATLAB: Programmatically using Report Generator to generate a Word report using templates generates an error: “Cannot find template”

MATLABmlreportgen

I am reading the MATLAB Report Generator documentation, and I am having some trouble understanding the "Automatic Numbering in Word Reports" section:

https://www.mathworks.com/help/rptgen/ug/automatically-number-document-content.html#bulfun2

I copied the code into my MATLAB, but when I try to run it, I get the following error message:

Error using mlreportgen.dom.DocumentPart/moveToNextHole

Cannot find template: MyReportTemplate.dotx

Error in Untitled2 (line 17)

moveToNextHole(chapterPart);

I think I need to have a template file called "MyReportTemplate.dotx" in my current path, but I don't know where to find it or how to create it myself.

I have tried all the other examples on this page, but this is the only one that gave me an error.

Best Answer

Before you can programmatically create a report using the Report Generator, you need to define a template file. In order to do this, you can use the following command. This creates a new blank template file using "mlreportgen.dom". Make sure that you only use this command once for each template you create, otherwise it will overwrite your existing template of the same name.

      Document.createTemplate('MyReportTemplate','docx');

https://www.mathworks.com/help/releases/R2016b/rptgen/ug/mlreportgen.dom.document.createtemplate.html

At this point, if you run your code, you might see the following error:

Error using mlreportgen.dom.DocumentPart/moveToNextHole

Document does not contain a document part template named: Chapter

Error in Untitled2 (line 17)

moveToNextHole(chapterPart);

This error occurs because the "MyReportTemplate.dotx" template file does not have a document part template with the title "Chapter". You will need to open "MyReportTemplate.dotx" in Microsoft word, and then follow the steps at the documentation link below in order to create the "Chapter" template. Please note that the "Automatic Numbering in Word Reports" example specifies the layout of the "Chapter" template.

https://www.mathworks.com/help/rptgen/ug/create-document-part-template-libraries.html

Related Solutions

MATLAB: How to add styles to a PDF template to use with a report

To add custom styles to a PDF template you can use the following workflow:

1. <https://www.mathworks.com/help/rptgen/ug/create-an-html-template.html Create a PDF template>, for example:

>> mlreportgen.dom.Document.createTemplate('mytemplate','pdf');

2. <https://www.mathworks.com/help/rptgen/ug/create-an-html-template.html Unzip the template>, for example:

>> unzipTemplate('mytemplate.pdftx')

3.<https://www.mathworks.com/help/rptgen/ug/modify-styles-in-pdf-templates.html#bu7zyyw-1 Modify the styles>, for example:

Add the following text to the "root.css" file in ../mytemplate/stylesheets

span.RedItalic {
    font-style: italic;
    color:Tomato;
}
 
span.Strong{
    font-weight: bold;
}

4. Zip the template back up, for example:

>> zipTemplate('mytemplate.pdftx')

5. Use the defined styles in the report, for example:

import mlreportgen.report.*;
import mlreportgen.dom.*;
 
doc = Report('newreport','pdf', 'mytemplate');
 
list = OrderedList({Text('This is normal text'),...
    Text('This is bold text', 'Strong'),...
    Text('This is red italic text', 'RedItalic')});
 
add(doc, list)
 
close(doc);

Similar workflow applies to HTML templates as well.

MATLAB: How to use a custom Word template for headers and footers in MATLAB Report Generator

To use a custom-made Word template, create a new document using the "mlreportgen.dom.Document" constructor and set the "templatePath" property to your DOTX file. Here is the documentation for a Document object:

<https://www.mathworks.com/help/rptgen/ug/mlreportgen.dom.document-class.html>

And here is a simple example using a custom-made template file from MS Word within the MALTAB Report Generator API:

import mlreportgen.dom.*

d = Document('MyWordDoc', 'docx', 'CustomTemplate.dotx'); %assuming template is in same folder; otherwise, specify full path

open(d);

append(d,'Hello World'); % add some text to generate doc

close(d);

rptview(d.OutputPath)

This formatting for headers and footers will disappear if you are adding chapters to the report. To customize chapter page headers, see the following documented examples for creating and editing chapter templates:

<https://www.mathworks.com/help/rptgen/ug/customize-chapter-page-headers-in-pdf-and-word-reports.html>

Best Answer

Related Solutions

MATLAB: How to add styles to a PDF template to use with a report

MATLAB: How to use a custom Word template for headers and footers in MATLAB Report Generator

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