On 9 Aug 2005 at 10:08, Doug Thompson wrote: ... > > I like OOo very much, don't get me wrong. But I get very frustrated > > with problems like this that have no good workaround. > > > > You can create templates that can be reused each time you want to use > mail merge. That way, you only have to go through all the fields one > time to set up conditional processing. > > I assume you are aware that you can put more than one field in a line of > text. The trick is to have your database fields properly normalized. > Then it is easy to include or exclude fields based on conditional > factors. That will easily handle your concern about idiosyncratic UK > addresses. > > I haven't the time and this isn't the proper forum for a dialogue on > data normalization, but even a minimal exposure to the concept will help > to resolve what you perceive as shortcomings in OOo and mail merge. > There are numerous tutorials available that can be found by a google > search on that two word phrase.
OK, I've had a chance to play around, after reading the document you suggested. It does look as though OOo goes some way to doing this, but there do seem to be some problems - either something's not clear to me, or there are outright bugs. Sorry if what follows is a bit lengthy. What I'm doing is displaying my address book database (it's just a spreadsheet) above my experimental document. The database has a field "Home Phone" which I'm playing with. I type in "hp=", then drag the database column header down, and then type "=hp" (so I can see field starts and ends). The text document now displays (I've got "view fields" enabled) hp=<Addresses.Sheet1.Home Phone>=hp I now swipe the cursor across all this to select it all, and hit control-F2 to get the Field Editor, and select Hidden Text. The Hidden Text box is prefilled with "hp=<Home Phone>=hp" (note loss of the path in the database). I drag the database column header down to the condition box, and prefix with "not " - the condition now reads not [Addresses.Sheet1.Home Phone] and click insert and close. I drag the "Home Phone" header onto a new line to see what happens without the condition. The text area now shows (all highlighted as a field as field shadings is turned on) Hidden text not [Addresses.Sheet1.Home Phone] hp=<Home Phone>=hp Addresses.Sheet1.Home Phone I then run this through the mail merge. Here's the first hiccup - it's not possible to get everything into a single file - OOo insists on generating one file per database entry. But never mind, worse to come!....... Now the files for those records with no home phone entry have two blank lines - that's fine. However those with a phone entry are incorrect. The second line is fine - it displays the correct phone number each time. But the first, conditional, line always displays the literal text hp=<Home Phone>=hp and I can find no way of getting the database entry substituted correctly. (I've tried editing the text in the Fields Editor box to no avail - I just get literal text every time). (Oh, I've also just found out about the "data to fields" button on the beamer - same result but a bit quicker :-) ) In passing, if I try this with a template file instead of a plain writer file, OOo names all the resulting files as .stw instead of .sxw. :-( Maybe I'm missing something, but could use more help please! Thanks. -- various incoming sites blocked because of spam; see http://www.scottsonline.org.uk for a list and openpgp crypto key (key fingerprint 2ACC 9F21 5103 F68C 7C32 9EA8 C949 81E1 31C9 1364) [EMAIL PROTECTED] Mike Scott, Harlow, Essex, England --------------------------------------------------------------------- To unsubscribe, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED] For additional commands, e-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
