Does anyone use Publisher for Large Municipal Budget Document Pub.

[AggieFinanceAdmin]

I am inheriting responsibility for a large municipal biennial budget document
publication. In the past they have literally cut and pasted (with scissors
and glue) pieces from Word and Excel...to put the document (which fills a 1"
slant-D ring style binder) together - even typing the page numbers on the
final original document by hand! Surely someone else out there publishes
municipal budgets on an annual or biennial basis....we are an "HTE Shop"
(anyone who uses SunGard HTE on an AS400 server will know what I mean) and
still on the greenscreen version. So, a great deal of data is pulled from
HTE into Excel spreadsheets...which are then used in the budget, along with
narrative text. I am thinking that with Publisher, I can bring in existing
narratives from Word and edit them in Publisher...and live link the related
Excel worksheets so that data remains current if updated...does anyone else
have experience along these lines? If so, how do you handle it? The other
cities we've talked to have had no "magic answer" for us.

 

[Mary Sauer]

There is a lot of information on the Microsoft site for Publisher. This is a hefty
task you are undertaking...
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/assistance/CH790018091033.aspx
When you go to the above site, input Excel in the search, many help articles are
available.

 

[°°MS-Publisher°°]

Suggest you use Serif PagePlus 10 which has everything you need built in for
professional printing.
I have done exactly what you are talking about.
http://www.serif.com/pageplus/pageplus10/index.asp

 

[Brian Kvalheim [MSFT MVP]]

Suggest you use Serif PagePlus 10 which has everything you need built
in for professional printing.
I have done exactly what you are talking about.
http://www.serif.com/pageplus/pageplus10/index.asp

Huh? Publisher does everything they just asked.
--
Brian Kvalheim
Microsoft Publisher MVP
http://www.publishermvps.com
Windows Marketplace Moderator

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and
confers no rights.

 

[Mike Koewler]

Brian,

Until PP10 came along I would never have recommended it, simply due to
the volume of pages, graphs, etc. A program would crawl after several
chapters. But the Build Book feature makes it easy to combine chapters
and synchronize styles.

Mike

 

[Brian Kvalheim [MSFT MVP]]

Brian,

Until PP10 came along I would never have recommended it, simply due to
the volume of pages, graphs, etc. A program would crawl after several
chapters. But the Build Book feature makes it easy to combine chapters
and synchronize styles.

There is no doubt. In PP 10 my use of the Build a Book feature exists, but
not in GREAT depth. However, reading the entire post, including linking to
Excel sheets and Word docs with auto-update works awesome in Publisher 2003.
A 1" binder is a max of 200 pagesish, and is certainly an acceptable number
of pages for Publisher.
--
Brian Kvalheim
Microsoft Publisher MVP
http://www.publishermvps.com
Windows Marketplace Moderator

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and
confers no rights.

 

[AggieFinanceAdmin]

I apologize for not responding sooner to your replies to my question! As I
am discovering is commonplace in Municipal Finance Departments...we have been
SOOOOOO busy that I've had barely any time to even attempt putting together
trial budget documents. I HAVE taken a look at the multitudes of word and
excel files the last person used to somehow assemble the entire document. No
wonder it had to be manually paginated! She has at least 30 directories
underneath "Budget Book 03-04" and no rhyme or reason to what they are or
what order they should be in (i.e., the file names do not correspond in any
way to the sections of the Budget Book!). ARGH!

After searching bookstores and on-line for a "handy desk reference and
guide" for Publisher...and not really finding anything remotely close to what
I was hoping for; we did purchase a $29.99 book & CD called "Microsoft Office
Document Designer" -- I just actually started working with it today for a few
hours...it's got some very pretty pre-set layouts, and I did manage to create
a template for the individual Departmental Narrative Text...but I already
knew how to save a template. I've never done much work with Styles and
Formatting, so played with that to come up with something a bit snappier than
the last budget...however, when I tried to save the template as a custom MODD
layout...it saved it, but then when I created a new MODD document and
selected my custom layout - it brought up one of the pre-sets, not my layout.
So, brought the book home and will attempt to find the section on "creating
and saving custom layouts" -- I am still not confident that this MODD is our
solution; in glancing through it, the suggestion is to use "snapshots" of
Excel spreadsheets (paste in a picture, not a live link)...because that is
more "secure." However, the whole point of inserting a live link --for me--
is that if (WHEN) it is revised by the department and/or our accounting
staff, when I open the document it will update links and I will have the most
current versions.

Sigh. I'll take a look at the Serif program that was mentioned -- haven't
heard of that one.

Thank you!
Aggie