mail merge data lost

[mheinemann]

I am trying to use Word 2003 mail merge directory to create a packing list
using data from Excel. One of the Excel columns contains both numbers and
alpha characters. The Excel column is defined as text. After the merge the
alpha characters are converted to zeros. I have tried to use DDE but get an
error message. How can I preserve the alpha characters?

 

[Peter Jamieson]

You have to ensure that the OLEDB provider/ODBC driver that gets the data
from Excel "sees" the numbers - or at least, the first 8 or 25 of them - as
text. Unfortunately, just formatting the cells in the column as text isn't
enough.

My guess is that the first 8 or 25 (probably the latter) entries in this
column contain a number. Please let us know if that's not the case. If it
is, try re-entering the first number in the column preceding it by a ' so
that Excel think's it's a text value. Then go through the process of
connecting to the data source again, and see if that does the trick.

Peter Jamieson

 

[Cindy M.]

Hi =?Utf-8?B?bWhlaW5lbWFubg==?=,

I am trying to use Word 2003 mail merge directory to create a packing list
using data from Excel. One of the Excel columns contains both numbers and
alpha characters. The Excel column is defined as text. After the merge the
alpha characters are converted to zeros. I have tried to use DDE but get an
error message. How can I preserve the alpha characters?

You probably tried to format the column as text using Format/Cell? This doesn't
save the "text" designation at the level where mail merge is accessing the
data. Instead, try selecting the column, then Data/Text to columns. The key is
setting the data type to "Text" in the last step.

Cindy Meister
INTER-Solutions, Switzerland
http://homepage.swissonline.ch/cindymeister (last update Jun 17 2005)
http://www.word.mvps.org

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