W2K: labels thrown "out of whack" when cell or table margins changed? How to fix ... ?

[StargateFanFromWork]

If the mail merge main document is changed to a catalog or directory type
mailmerge document, another row of labels will be added at the bottom of
the sheet. There is however only one table in the document, so the NSEW
points would not appear.

No everything is fine re the type of doct. Helper clearly still states
"Merge type: Mailing Labels".

But I'm just ready to tear my hair out again, all the trials I did yesterday
didn't put a section break in and the second page's table of labels started
on the previous page so that after the 4x20 labels, an extra row would
appear so that it looked like I was getting 4x21 labels per page until the
last page. I added the extra "Section Break (Continuous)" and that fixed it
yesterday.

Now this morning, however, using the same docts., I'm getting a merged doct
that shows a "Section Break (Continuous)" _and_ a "Section Break (Next
Page)". Talk about going round the bend! Word is going to drive me nuts.

At any rate, the 2 codes fit on the bottom of each pg (pg. 2, the last page,
has 2 "continuous" ones rather than one "continuous" and one "next page"
section break code, btw) and no blank pages are generated so I'm just going
to leave the section break code I put into the template as it absolutely did
not work without it yesterday. Even though there are no blank pages coming
out with this test and sometime in future, who knows but that they might get
an extra blank page in between each label sheet, I think that that's an
easier error for the average user to deal with than getting a result that
needs a page break to be put in the exact spot to separate the tables to get
the correct 4x20 labels on each page.

If the mail merge main document is changed to a letter type mailmerge main
document, and the Next Page Section Break that normally separates the
pages, somehow got changed to a Continuous Section break, then another row
of labels will be added to the bottom of the sheet and in this instance,
that row of labels is in a second table in the document so the NSEW points
will appear.

Makes sense except. This didn't happen, though. The same doct. I tried out
again today was a label doct yet without having put in the added section
break, no page break was added yesterday. Yet this morning it did work even
without it. I'm at a loss to figure out why it worked differently today,
but must admit that Word never ceases to play little tricks like this with
me <g>.

Anyway, I now have a working doct. that my guys can use for adding info to
each unit they're repairing so that's what counts.

Thanks. Really appreciate all the help. D

--
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

Another thing to check - if you bring up the Mail Merge Helper, does it
still say you are doing a label merge? If it had somehow changed to being
a Catalog merge, then it probably wouldn't do a page break after it had
merged each page. If there was space for a complete table row at the
bottom of the page, it would probably be added to the existing table.
Adding a section break might change that behaviour. However, that's a bit
far-fetched.

In any case, I don't really see how MailMerge can be cramming 21 rows
onto one page if they are the correct height to match your label
stationery, which suggests that there's still something wrong in the
layout department.

Peter Jamieson

[snip]

wait a minute ... just noticed something ... I'll be danged. The last
table row at the bottom of the first page is actually the first table
row of a second table that should actually start on page 2. I had not
seen the square with the NSEW points before signalling the start of a
table because the mouse pointer must be in a certain spot over a table,
as we all know, and I hadn't mouse over any area in the table that
would show this before until now. I just inserted a page break between
the two "tables" and everything was fine.

So, what does this mean? Am I missing a break of some sort at the
bottom of my original Word template? Could it be something as simple
as that??

[snip]

I played around with this and ended up inserting a section break right
underneath the end of the table on the page of my original Word
template. That seemed to do the trick. Is this acceptable Word usage
for this type of thing? I'm asking because sometimes what we stumble
upon doing is the best way to do something and it might cause problems
down the road in other situations. Again, this seemed to do the trick.
I'll test tomorrow by adding pages of dummy info to the Excel file to
get several sheets in the merge and I'll see what happens then.

Thanks. D

 

[Peter Jamieson]

Just one thing I'd like to check - your Mail Merge Main document does only
have one page?

Peter Jamieson

If the mail merge main document is changed to a catalog or directory type
mailmerge document, another row of labels will be added at the bottom of
the sheet. There is however only one table in the document, so the NSEW
points would not appear.

No everything is fine re the type of doct. Helper clearly still states
"Merge type: Mailing Labels".

But I'm just ready to tear my hair out again, all the trials I did
yesterday didn't put a section break in and the second page's table of
labels started on the previous page so that after the 4x20 labels, an
extra row would appear so that it looked like I was getting 4x21 labels
per page until the last page. I added the extra "Section Break
(Continuous)" and that fixed it yesterday.

Now this morning, however, using the same docts., I'm getting a merged
doct that shows a "Section Break (Continuous)" _and_ a "Section Break
(Next Page)". Talk about going round the bend! Word is going to drive me
nuts.

At any rate, the 2 codes fit on the bottom of each pg (pg. 2, the last
page, has 2 "continuous" ones rather than one "continuous" and one "next
page" section break code, btw) and no blank pages are generated so I'm
just going to leave the section break code I put into the template as it
absolutely did not work without it yesterday. Even though there are no
blank pages coming out with this test and sometime in future, who knows
but that they might get an extra blank page in between each label sheet, I
think that that's an easier error for the average user to deal with than
getting a result that needs a page break to be put in the exact spot to
separate the tables to get the correct 4x20 labels on each page.

If the mail merge main document is changed to a letter type mailmerge
main document, and the Next Page Section Break that normally separates
the pages, somehow got changed to a Continuous Section break, then
another row of labels will be added to the bottom of the sheet and in
this instance, that row of labels is in a second table in the document so
the NSEW points will appear.

Makes sense except. This didn't happen, though. The same doct. I tried
out again today was a label doct yet without having put in the added
section break, no page break was added yesterday. Yet this morning it did
work even without it. I'm at a loss to figure out why it worked
differently today, but must admit that Word never ceases to play little
tricks like this with me <g>.

Anyway, I now have a working doct. that my guys can use for adding info to
each unit they're repairing so that's what counts.

Thanks. Really appreciate all the help. D

--
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

Another thing to check - if you bring up the Mail Merge Helper, does it
still say you are doing a label merge? If it had somehow changed to
being a Catalog merge, then it probably wouldn't do a page break after
it had merged each page. If there was space for a complete table row at
the bottom of the page, it would probably be added to the existing
table. Adding a section break might change that behaviour. However,
that's a bit far-fetched.

In any case, I don't really see how MailMerge can be cramming 21 rows
onto one page if they are the correct height to match your label
stationery, which suggests that there's still something wrong in the
layout department.

Peter Jamieson


[snip]

wait a minute ... just noticed something ... I'll be danged. The last
table row at the bottom of the first page is actually the first table
row of a second table that should actually start on page 2. I had not
seen the square with the NSEW points before signalling the start of a
table because the mouse pointer must be in a certain spot over a
table, as we all know, and I hadn't mouse over any area in the table
that would show this before until now. I just inserted a page break
between the two "tables" and everything was fine.

So, what does this mean? Am I missing a break of some sort at the
bottom of my original Word template? Could it be something as simple
as that??

[snip]

I played around with this and ended up inserting a section break right
underneath the end of the table on the page of my original Word
template. That seemed to do the trick. Is this acceptable Word usage
for this type of thing? I'm asking because sometimes what we stumble
upon doing is the best way to do something and it might cause problems
down the road in other situations. Again, this seemed to do the trick.
I'll test tomorrow by adding pages of dummy info to the Excel file to
get several sheets in the merge and I'll see what happens then.

Thanks. D

 

[StargateFanFromWork]

Just one thing I'd like to check - your Mail Merge Main document does only
have one page?

[snip]

Yes. It's always been just the one page.

Go figure ...

 

[Peter Jamieson]

OK, I had another look at this and get the 21 rows you describe. This is
definitely an error in Word 2000's layout algorithm as you only have to
reveal the paragraph marks etc. to see that there is an unconditional new
page break under row 20. However, when you hide paragraph marks or print
preview, it's definitely 21 rows per page.

However, going into File|Page Setup does show a likely cause which is that
the bottom margin is set to 0. If I change it to 36pt (0.4 or 0.5in would
probably do) the problem goes away.

I suspect this uncertainty about where to place row 21 is responsible for
the jittery display as well.

Peter Jamieson

Just one thing I'd like to check - your Mail Merge Main document does
only have one page?

[snip]

Yes. It's always been just the one page.

Go figure ...

 

[StargateFanFromWork]

OK, I had another look at this and get the 21 rows you describe. This is
definitely an error in Word 2000's layout algorithm as you only have to
reveal the paragraph marks etc. to see that there is an unconditional new
page break under row 20. However, when you hide paragraph marks or print
preview, it's definitely 21 rows per page.

However, going into File|Page Setup does show a likely cause which is that
the bottom margin is set to 0. If I change it to 36pt (0.4 or 0.5in would
probably do) the problem goes away.

I suspect this uncertainty about where to place row 21 is responsible for
the jittery display as well.

Interesting. I wasn't able to get bottom margins to work at either .5, .4,
..3 or .2 inches, and Word insisted on putting .1 to .17 but this is good to
know. If I ever run into this type of problem again with merges, this
thread in the archives will definitely help as there's an arsenal of things
to try in order to get the merges to work properly. Thank you!

After lunch, I also much check to see to see if I'm still missing a couple
of labels. I've printed out the documents and will compare both then.
Thank goodness there are only 122 records to check through <g>.

Cheers. D

Peter Jamieson

Just one thing I'd like to check - your Mail Merge Main document does
only have one page?

[snip]

Yes. It's always been just the one page.

Go figure ...