A report is constructed by printing each record in a particular register one by one. If there are conditions, each record in turn is checked to see if it meets the conditions and if it does it will be printed. For example, in a report listing approved Invoices, each Invoice in the Invoice register will be checked to see if it has been approved. Only if it has been approved will it be printed. This process is sometimes known as "looping": the report is going round in a circle or loop applying the same tests to and then printing each record in turn. A search will reduce the number of records in the loop and therefore reduce the time required to print the report. For example, there might be a search for Invoices belonging to a single Customer. That Customer's Invoices will then be put into the loop where each one will be tested to see if it has been approved.

In these web pages, the following terms have been used:

Current Selection: The group of records in a loop. This can be the entire content of a register, or the records that have been found by a search.
Current Record: The single record being tested or printed at a particular moment.

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