Mail merge nightmares

[Lee Harris]

Can anyone explain what is happening here -

I've got a 5 cell table, including a first item of data and 4 "next records"
linked to an excel sheet with 100 records in it. When I click the button to
"merge to new document", I can see in the status bar it seems to be
processing 100's of records even though in the mail merge doc I've only
linked to 5. This is causing problems when I put 100 next records in the
main doc, and merge to new, its getting corrupt tables everywhere

what I'd like to know is how I can find out what "merge to new doc" is
doing, where it's getting its info from and why, when the main doc is a 5
column by 1 row table is the "merge to new" creating a 10 page document like
it's trying to read the whole excel file but not properly displaying them
all

 

[Doug Robbins - Word MVP]

Exactly what do you have in the table in the mail merge main document?
Particularly after the "next records" fields?

Is the only mergefield the one in the first row?

What exactly are you trying to produce? Give us an example of what the
finished product is supposed to be and how the data is arranged.

--
Hope this helps.

Please reply to the newsgroup unless you wish to avail yourself of my
services on a paid consulting basis.

Doug Robbins - Word MVP

 

[Graham Mayor]

How have you linked this to only five records?
What on earth is the purpose of 100 'next record' fields?
What is the document type?

--
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Graham Mayor - Word MVP


<>>< ><<> ><<> <>>< ><<> <>>< <>><<>

 

[Peter Jamieson]

Just a bit of explanation in addition to what the others have said:

When you merge to a new document, Word (in effect)
a. creates a new document
b. starts with the first record in the data source
c. creates a copy of the mail merge main document and starts filling in
MERGEFIELD and other fields from the data in that record. If it encounters a
<<Next record>> field ({ NEXT } field) then it simply starts taking data
from the next record in the data source.
d. appends the filled-in copy to the new document
e. moves to the next record in the data source and repeats (b) to (d),
until there are no records left.

For example, if you have 5 <<Next record>> fields in your mail merge main
document, Word will start with record 1, then for the next pass through the
mail merge main document, it will already have "consumed" records 2,3,4,5
and 6 and will start with 7.

Word also does special stuff with "NEXTIF" and "SKIPIF" fields, and takes
account of the start and end records you specify, and any selections you may
also have specified

If the Mail Merge type is "Letters" (Form letters), Word outputs a section
break after each pass through the mail merge main document. if the type is
"Directory" (also called "Catalog"), Word does not add any breaks. (Well,
that is the overall effect, anyway).

When people first start using merge, I suspect it is quite common to get
confused about what <<Next record>> and the NEXTIF/SKIPIF stuff actually do,
partly because most people probably start using them to try to perform a
merge that processes "multiple items per record", and merge isn't really
quite up to that task.

Peter Jamieson