Mail merge and pictures

[GrumbleDook]

Perhaps I am banging my head against a brick wall here ...

I would like to take a word document.

I would like to merge into it data from an excel spreadsheet.

However, one of the fields is the location of a picture (student piccies) and I would like to insert the picture in rather than just "d:\pics\008789.bmp" (which doesn't really work anyway as the mail merge strips out the punctuation)

Any ideas on this?

Oh yeah ... it is for printing off at 9 am tomorrow morning, all because SIMS won't flippin' do it!!!

[mark]

googled these:

http://www.computorcompanion.com/LMMArticle.asp?ID=126

http://groups.google.com/group/micro...ontextures.com

[alan-d]

What version of SIMS?

SIMS.Net will allow it via the reports. Just create one including the field containing the picture.

[GrumbleDook]

Yep ... tried that ... if you take the standard report and try and doctor it to get what I want if fails to put in the picture ( an known feature apparently due to the way office 2002 and upwards deal with the INCLUDEPICTURE code to try and prevent malicious pictures running nasty code ... even though lots of places have it all working Capita don't like it and so tell you to bugger off.

Strangely they do say that there are several commenrcial packages out there that will do exactly what we want ... and that we should by into it.

We sort of have it sorted now though, thanks to Mark and thanks to Stephen ... the final merge not only needs to be load into a new document it needs to be refreshed again afterwards to make sure there is an different picture in each record.

Now all I need to do is print them off and laminate then ... it is almost worth the cost of going for a commercial package to save the time, hassle and make it easy for a non-techie person just to select the studnet and click print.

[Ric_]

@GrumbleDook: If the problem is with Office, why not try it with a superior product Can't think of one off the top of my head

[GrumbleDook]

I did ... I used my mac and Automator and can get what I want very easily ... the idea is to have it so that is a duplicate lunch pass is needed it can be run of by one of the student office staff and is linked to our MIS so we are not having to change student information in yet another database.

That is why I wanted it in SIMS.

It is sorted for the moment ... but I will be looking for alternatives around February next year ...

[alan-d]

Yep ... tried that ... if you take the standard report and try and doctor it to get what I want if fails to put in the picture ( an known feature apparently due to the way office 2002 and upwards deal with the INCLUDEPICTURE code to try and prevent malicious pictures running nasty code ...

Strange - we use Office 2003 and it works fine :? Mind you we didn't doctor a standard report we created one from scratch.

[ChrisH]

Ok I am going to dig this old post up because I want to do something similar but cant get it to work. I want to have a sheet of information on a pupil which will merge in from SIMS and the rest will be filled in by hand. I want the students photo on this though but I cant get it to work.
The only way I can get photos to show up is to use a word list but that does not produce the kind of output I want as it just plonks the photo in the first box per record. I want it to go where I tell it to. I am ready to delve into VBA if I need to. I just need pushing in the right direction first.

Thanks in advance

Chris

[jcollings]

Ok I am going to dig this old post up because I want to do something similar but cant get it to work. I want to have a sheet of information on a pupil which will merge in from SIMS and the rest will be filled in by hand. I want the students photo on this though but I cant get it to work.
The only way I can get photos to show up is to use a word list but that does not produce the kind of output I want as it just plonks the photo in the first box per record. I want it to go where I tell it to. I am ready to delve into VBA if I need to. I just need pushing in the right direction first.

Thanks in advance

Chris

I have done something similar using RTF reports IIRC

http://www.eiskent.co.uk/SIMSQuickRe...0Templates.pdf

[TechMonkey]

No help I am afraid but we have had no end of problems with pictures in Mailmerges. One of the teaching modules here has it in as they create their own top trump cards but it has always been hit and miss on whether the picture comes in at all or whether it gets updated properly. Often they would get the same picture on each merge.

[ChrisH]

I have done something similar using RTF reports IIRC

http://www.eiskent.co.uk/SIMSQuickRe...0Templates.pdf

Thanks this has got me somewhere. Just need to find out why the word tables keep breaking after the first student.

[ChrisH]

Ok fixed the tables, just need to find why it ignoring page breaks grrrrr.