automattically generated documents?

M

Mark

is there any way you can have a document generate using
text from another file? the point of this is to have a
form letter created using data in a file that is already
filled out. Data would be exactly the same, just in a
different format.
Thanks in advance.
 
K

KurtMD

Hello Susan and all,

I saw your answer to Mark and wondered if you could help me with an advanced
question concerning a project I'm working on for a client of mine.

I have created an Excel 'Source File' (or Master List) using thier client
list of First Name, Last Name, Title, Company Name, Street Address, City,
State and Zip in row 1 as column identifiers. I've then created multiple
'Sub-lists' (for different purposes) by pasting links from different rows in
the 'Source File' so all that ever needs to be edited is the 'Source File'
to keep ALL 'Sub-lists' current. Some of the names and addresses are listed
in multiple 'Sub-lists' but, no 1 'Sub-list' contains all the names from the
'Source File'. This is all working perfectly fine.

The problem I'm having is when I use MS Word to create sheets of mailing
labeles using these Excel 'Sub-lists' as the merge file, there is no data
and the process is halted. I do understand these Excel 'Sub-lists' do not
contain HARD or REAL data but rather, links to data from the 'Source File'.
So, I'm stumped! Is there any way I can possibly make this work short of
doing all this via a full fledged Data Base app?

I do know that Office XP allows individual rows to be chosen from within a
'Source File' (Master List) to aid in the creation of merge files but, this
will become quite tedious since my client has 8 'Sub lists' being managed by
this 'Source File'. BTW, I'm creating these files using Office XP but, my
client is using Office 2K.

Any help in overcoming this dilemma will be graciously accepted and truly
appreciated!!

Kurt Dschida
 
S

Susan Ramlet

Hi, KurtMD,

You may want to post to one of the Excel newsgroups where you'll find more
folks who can get into the nitty-gritty of how you might accomplish this in
Excel.

At first glance, it sounds to me like Access would be the best way to
accomplish what you're trying to do, because Excel's database capabilities
are somewhat limited. It's really a spreadsheet, and you'll be constrained
by that limitation unless you want to do some VBA to automate the data
processing. You could possibly automate Excel to copy its sub-lists and
paste values (not the formulas) into a clean worksheet for merging.

Hope that helps get you started, at least--
 

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