blank lines in a mail merge

[Hilary Ratner]

Hi. One of my users is creating a mail merge letter using
Word 2003 and using an Excel file as the data source.

Here's the situation: There is an address field that may
contain three to six lines of text. We do NOT want to
suppress any of the blank lines--we want the blank lines
to show. In older versions of Word, while setting up the
merge you had the option of printing or not printing the
blank lines. I can't find that option in 2003.

Any help is much appreciated!

Hilary

 

[Cindy M -WordMVP-]

Hi Hilary,

In my website's mail merge FAQ there's a Word 2002 section.
And in it you'll find a topic about restoring old
functionality. You want to get the "Mail merge..." button
back onto your toolbar; the option you're looking for is in
that dialog box.

Note: if the reason this is important for you is the page
layout (nothing should move up or down on the page) you
might consider using a TABLE with an exact row height to
maintain this, rather than retaining blank lines.

One of my users is creating a mail merge letter using
Word 2003 and using an Excel file as the data source.

Here's the situation: There is an address field that may
contain three to six lines of text. We do NOT want to
suppress any of the blank lines--we want the blank lines
to show. In older versions of Word, while setting up the
merge you had the option of printing or not printing the
blank lines. I can't find that option in 2003.

Cindy Meister
INTER-Solutions, Switzerland
http://homepage.swissonline.ch/cindymeister (last update
Sep 30 2003)
http://www.word.mvps.org

This reply is posted in the Newsgroup; please post any
follow question or reply in the newsgroup and not by e-mail

 

[Guest]

Hi Cindy.

I couldn't find the FAQ you are referring to. I looked at
the Mail Merge FAQ but there was no mention of 2002.
Please advise.

Thanks!

Hilary

 

[Hilary Ratner]

OK, we got the old Word menu back however...we are unable
to merge any Excel docs. I get an error saying it cannot
find the table. Any ideas?

Thanks!

 

[Cindy M -WordMVP-]

Hi Hilary,

OK, we got the old Word menu back however...we are unable
to merge any Excel docs. I get an error saying it cannot
find the table. Any ideas?

Which menu are you using? Sounds like the Mail Merge Helper,
and not the one I had in mind...

If that's the case, you can go this route, but: Is the data
at the top left of the first sheet in the Excel workbook?
The default will only work like that...

Otherwise, activate the "Select method" checkbox in the Open
Data Source dialog box and choose ODBC. If you still don't
see your table, click "Options" and activate all the
checkboxes.

Cindy Meister
INTER-Solutions, Switzerland
http://homepage.swissonline.ch/cindymeister (last update Sep
30 2003)
http://www.word.mvps.org

This reply is posted in the Newsgroup; please post any
follow question or reply in the newsgroup and not by e-mail