Merging a Conditional Number of Records to the Same Document (Revisited)

[Cathryn]

I am able to merge a conditional number of records into
one document using a method very similar to Microsoft
Knowledge Base Article 105888. My problem is that I need
to do this twice in the same document (I will refer to
these as the first merge and second merge).

How do I reset the record numbering so the second merge
begins with the first record in the merge sequence?
Currently, I am stuck on the final record in the merge
sequence from the first merge.

I'm using Word 97 with Access 97 as my datasource.

 

[Doug Robbins - Word MVP]

I am not sure exactly what you are trying to achieve. However, it sounds
like something that would probably be better done using a Report in Access,
perhaps something that could be handled using the method described in the
"Multiple items per condition" item under the "Special merges" section of
fellow MVP CIndy Meister's website at

http://homepage.swissonline.ch/cindymeister/MergFram.htm

Alternatively, you might be able to complete each of the merges separately
and then combine the results.

--
Please post any further questions or followup to the newsgroups for the
benefit of others who may be interested. Unsolicited questions forwarded
directly to me will only be answered on a paid consulting basis.

Hope this helps
Doug Robbins - Word MVP

 

[Cathryn]

Maybe I can better explain...

I'm working on a legal form called a Bill of Complaint.
At the top of the form, I list all parties involved in
the suit and state whether each of them is being served
by personal service at their address (in which case I
include thier address information) or by publication. At
the bottom of the form, there is a Certificate of Mailing
which the attorney must sign declaring that a copy of the
Bill of Complaint has been mailed to all parties involved
and lists each individual with his or her address. It
should be noted that there are individuals who are listed
with an address in the Certificate of Mailing who are not
listed with an address at the top of the form, hence I
cannot write language similar to "A copy has been mailed
all persons at their addresses listed above."

There are many different word fields (including NEXTIF,
IF, SET, etc.) being used in my form, and many are
nested. This cannot be completed as a report since I need
to fill-in portions of the form (using the ASK function)
and the text of the form is different based on other
variables.

Maybe this long explanation will help with answering my
question. Alternatively, how would I complete the merges
independently and combine the results automatically (it
would be better if I didn't need to combine them manually
since I would be creating more than 125 multi-page
documents at one time).

I appreciate any insight you may be able to provide. I've
already been to Ms. Meister's website with no luck.

 

[Doug Robbins - Word MVP]

Hi Cathryn,

The explanation does give a better understanding of what you need to do, but
I believe that it is one of those things that would need a custom
application to be developed. As such, it makes it very hard without access
to the datasource and a sample of the document that you want to create (and
information on what is being inserted by use of the ASK fields) to give you
a solution be saying simply "Do A and then B"

At what point in the process (the top of the form or the Certificate of
Mailing) did you need to "reset the record numbering so the second merge
begins with the first record in the merge sequence"?

Where do the 125+ documents come into the picture? Do you need to be able
to create 125+ Bills of Complaint in one go or are there 125+ Certificates?

In other words, I guess the long explanation is still not enough <g> As
they say, a picture is worth a thousand words.

--
Please post any further questions or followup to the newsgroups for the
benefit of others who may be interested. Unsolicited questions forwarded
directly to me will only be answered on a paid consulting basis.

Hope this helps
Doug Robbins - Word MVP

 

[Peter Jamieson]

I'd follow Doug's discussion, but one way would be to create an Access query
that doubles up the entire list of records using a UNION.

Let's suppose your table/query needs to be sequenced on fields f1, f2, and
f3 and you need a few more fields f4,f5, f6.

The SQL would be something like this:

SELECT 1 AS 'f0', f1, f2, f3, f4, f5, f6 FROM mytable
UNION
SELECT 2 AS 'f0', f1, f2, f3, f4, f5, f6 FROM mytable
ORDER BY 1,2,3,4

(I may have got the precise syntax wrong but it would be something along
those lines - also, off the top of my head I can't remember whether Access
allows eg.

SELECT 1 AS 'f0', f1, f2, f3, * FROM mytable
UNION
SELECT 2 AS 'f0', f1, f2, f3, * FROM mytable
ORDER BY 1,2,3,4
).

(BTW if you find yourself moving to Word 2002 or later you won't be able to
connect to a union query using the default connection method and will need
to use an ODBC or DDE connection)