Merge-differences in Word 2000/2003/XP

[Glenn De Tollenaere]

Hi all,

I have an application that creates a mergedocument in
combination with a textfile that acts as the datasource.

Now I wonder if there is a possibility to merge the
document without Word creating a new document ? What I'd
like to do is to merge the datasource into the main
document (so no extra intervention is needed to overwrite
the main document with the newly generated one, that
option works but it swaps the screen several times and is
not very performant).

Other option I have tried is to print merged, so the
document remains unchanged. But in this case, in Word 98
& 2000 I get an extra dialog (print) which I don't want
to appear. This seems to be a known issue and I wonder if
there is any known work-around (merging first to a new
document is for the same reason given above not
applicable: swapping of the screen and performance).

Next to (mail)merge, what other options could I possibly
use to address a letter to several addressees (in order
to avoid the problems mentioned above, especially speed
is an issue) ?

Any help appreciated
Glenn

 

[Cindy M -WordMVP-]

Hi Glenn,

The end result, I take it, is simply the printed page? You
don't need to save any files with the merged data?

In that case, if you want to stick with mail merge, how
about looping through each record, while still viewing the
main document, and printing the main document? You'd
probably still get screen flicker, because you would be
looping through the records on screen, but it might be
faster than what you're doing now.

The only other choice would be automating the process
completely, and passing the data into, say, form fields or
bookmarks, then printing. With a small number of records the
time difference might not be noticeable, but with a large
number of records it should be faster than mail merge.

Now I wonder if there is a possibility to merge the
document without Word creating a new document ? What I'd
like to do is to merge the datasource into the main
document (so no extra intervention is needed to overwrite
the main document with the newly generated one, that
option works but it swaps the screen several times and is
not very performant).

Other option I have tried is to print merged, so the
document remains unchanged. But in this case, in Word 98
& 2000 I get an extra dialog (print) which I don't want
to appear. This seems to be a known issue and I wonder if
there is any known work-around (merging first to a new
document is for the same reason given above not
applicable: swapping of the screen and performance).

Next to (mail)merge, what other options could I possibly
use to address a letter to several addressees (in order
to avoid the problems mentioned above, especially speed
is an issue) ?

Cindy Meister
INTER-Solutions, Switzerland
http://homepage.swissonline.ch/cindymeister (last update Jun
8 2004)
http://www.word.mvps.org

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