>>>for some reason when I 'repo form somerpt" within a form, and do a preview, the whole report consists of record number one,listing the way down the whole page. did I forget to do something?
>>
>>My guess is that you do not have the database selected that is in the detail band. That the only way I've seen this happen.
>>HTH
>
>Ok, this form is to service several databases with same struct but different names. I removed the data environment for this reason, was this a mistake?

I don't think so. But you will also have to make sure that you don't have alias in field names and make sure your program selects the correct data before report.