Crystal Reports – Filter duplicates by field

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The following guide describes how to filter (remove) duplicate rows by a particular field.

In this example we are using Crystal Reports 2008 (version 12) to customise the report. The duplicate row is being identified by the ‘First Name’ column.

 

  1. Open the report and select the ‘Preview’ tab
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  3. Note the duplicate rows – ‘Robyn’ is listed twice.
  4. Open the ‘Report’ menu then select ‘Section Expert’
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  6. Select the ‘Details’ section from the left hand menu
  7. Tick the ‘Suppress No Drill-Down’ option and click on the icon to the right of it
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  9. Using the ‘Report Feilds’ list, double click on the field you need to filter. This will update the formula below.
  10. Type =previous( and double click on the field you need to filter again. Type in ) to finish the formula
  11. Your formula should look like: 
    {a_w_contacts.FirstName}=previous({a_w_contacts.FirstName})
  12. Click ‘Save and close’ then ‘OK’ to save the changes
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  14. The report will now automatically suppress (exclude or filter) a row which is the same as the previous.
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