How do I merge using alternative fields??

[Mike Cunningham]

I am trying to mail merge a letter where I have two
different fields that could be used after Dear. One is a
preferred field (less formal) the other would be used if
the first one isn't a part of a record. For example the
preferred field might be Dear Jim and Brenda, but if not
available I would substitute title and lname or Dear Mr. &
Mrs. Jones.

Help! is there anyway to do this in word 2000 working from
an excel spreadsheet as my data source.

 

[Peter Jamieson]

You can use an IF field. In this case it might be something like

{ IF "{ MERGEFIELD preferredfieldname }" = ""
"{ MERGEFIELD title } { MERGEFIELD lname }"
"{ MERGEFIELD preferredfieldname }" }

What you actually need will depend on how your data is structured etc.

All the {} need to be the special field braces you can insert using ctrl-F9.
Everything else is plain text. Personally I find it easier to insert this
kind of "nested field" by hand rather than use Word's facilities for doing
it, and use Alt-F9 to toggle between "fields" and "results" views.