Linking from Visio to Excel

[Vondre Daniel]

Hello,

I have a task for creating Visio digrams of floorplans. I have to link each
shape in the floorplan to an Excel spreadsheet. I need to create a relative
path link and a dynamic link to the Excel spreadsheet for each shape. These
xls files will be updated on a weekly basis. I need for these links to never
break b/c there will be over 500 of them. How can I accomplish this task? I'm
not sure of the difference between a relative link or a dynamic link!
Whatever info you can provide would be appreciated! Thanks in advance!

 

[David Parker [Visio MVP]]

Check out the Database Wizard, you can use it to create these links, and to
refresh the shapes later, using an ODBC link to an Excel spreadsheet.

 

[Vondre Daniel]

What is the difference between a relative path link and a dynamic link? Why
would I have to refresh the shapes? Thanks for your comments!

 

[David Parker [Visio MVP]]

You said that you want to refresh the shapes from the Excel spreadsheet each
week.
The ODBC connection will have the path to the Excel spreadsheet.
Each shape will be linked to a row in the spreadsheet via the ODBC
connection.
Each shape can have custom properties with the value from each cell in the
row.
When you change a value in the cell, the shape custom property will not be
automatically refreshed. You have to refresh the shape by one of the
methods available in the Database Wizard.

 

[Vondre Daniel]

How do you link multiple shapes to an existing excel spreadsheet and get the
shapes to match up with the row that provides their accurate data? The excel
files will be updated on a weekly basis, so the ODBC is what I will need to
keep it synchronized?

 

[David Parker [Visio MVP]]

Correct.
Play with the Database Wizard.
You will get best results if you have unique column names in Excel; avoid
special characters in the column titles; including spaces; define the data
as a named region called "Database".

 

[Vondre Daniel]

What do you mean when you say " define data as a named region called Database?

 

[David Parker [Visio MVP]]

In Excel, I have assumed that you have column headings with unique rows of
data.
Select the data, including the headings, and then Insert / Name / Define and
call it "Database"

 

[David Ashe]

Can the Database Wizard link to a Sharepoint List?

David

 

[ravenze]

Dude, thank you for posting this. I've been trying for 3 days(on and off) to
get this working and now (finally) it seems to be working. You're "da-man!!!"

 

[David Parker [Visio MVP]]

Glad to be of service!