mail merge and Excel

[Mark]

When I try to utilize mail merge I get a message "unable to open data base"
even though I have followed the instructions to the letter. What am I
missing?

 

[Cindy Meister]

Which version of Word and Excel are involved here?

-- Cindy

 

[Mark]

When I try to utilize mail merge I get a message "unable to open data base"
even though I have followed the instructions to the letter. What am I
missing?

I am using 2003 for both. My previous experience was with 2000 and was
pretty straightforward and simple. Three people in our office followed the
step by step instructions and can't seem to complete the process. I'm sure
it's something simple but we can't see it.

Mark

 

[Cindy Meister]

Hi Mark

OK, I think I understand where you're coming from, now Although "unable
to open database" is not something I generally expect for Word 2003, so it
may take a bit of research.

On my website (http://homepage/swissonline.ch/cindymeister), you'll find a
section in the MailMerge FAQ about Word 2002/2003 that explains a little bit
about how things have changed. There are two things you should look at,
particulary

1. The instructions on getting back the old functionality. You can use that
to bring up the Mail Merge Helper interface you used to use. See if that will
connect to the data source successfully

2. The instructions on how you can choose the way Word connects to the data.
This changed for Word 2002/2003, and it's possible the error you're seeing is
specific to that (and not generally a problem with mail merge). If that's the
case, (1) will take care of it, but it's good to know how to use other
connection methods, as well.

DDE is what Word used to use for Excel, and what the Mail merge helper will
continue to use. OLE DB is the new thing, that's not optimal for either Excel
or Access. ODBC is something "in between" that you can use if Office 2003 on
your new system doesn't support DDE very well.

-- Cindy