create mailmerge with spreadsheet librecalc without using libre base ! pls help how to do it TQ

users
#21

Am 02.02.2012 01:52, sonic wrote:

Hi bro,
Do you have any alternative ways to do in libre base.. directly is there any tutorial for doing mail merge in libre base.
yes i found out already can upgrade or edit data in spreadsheet after registered the spreadsheet in base..
TQ
regards,
sonic

Once you have a Base document connected and registered, you can hit F4 in Writer, select the table or query you are interested in and then drag the column headers from the right pane of the data source browser into the document. This will import the required placeholders on the fly and you can arrange these database fields like any other type of Writer field.
Then you start printing and confirm that you are going to print a serial letter. In the next dialog you may restrict the incoming row set by some filter or manual selection and you may choose to print into another Writer document.
If you need some fixed filters (for instance all rows where name, zip, city and address are not empty), then you may add a query to the database document and use the query instead of the table. This is where it becomes very convenient that Base provides a database view on your spreadsheet tables.

#22

Wow!

Just to be absolutely crystal clear, when you say

If you need some fixed filters (for instance all rows where name, zip,
city and address are not empty), then you may add a query to the
database document and use the query instead of the table.

You are saying that it is possible to mailmerge using a query to supply the
data? I know that's what it looks like you said, but there's just been a
long thread here that concluded this was not possible, so I'm just checking.
If so, is it new (3.4.5) functionality?

Regards
Mark Stanton
One small step for mankind...

#23

Am 02.02.2012 18:57, Mark Stanton wrote:

Wow!

Just to be absolutely crystal clear, when you say

If you need some fixed filters (for instance all rows where name, zip,
city and address are not empty), then you may add a query to the
database document and use the query instead of the table.

You are saying that it is possible to mailmerge using a query to supply the
data? I know that's what it looks like you said, but there's just been a
long thread here that concluded this was not possible, so I'm just checking.
If so, is it new (3.4.5) functionality?

Regards
Mark Stanton
One small step for mankind...

I do so since OOo 1.0.

#24

Hi Mark,

You are saying that it is possible to mailmerge using a query to supply the
data? I know that's what it looks like you said, but there's just been a
long thread here that concluded this was not possible, so I'm just checking.

The other thread did not say that. The question from the original post was how to make sure that the Query was selected by default for the mailmerge, without having to manually select it each time. For whatever reason, bug ou incomplete functionality, one does not appear to be able to do this, hence the suggestion that a View be used instead because is a View appears to be handled like a table for the purposes of mailmerge.

As Andreas says, it has been possible to use a Query for mailmerge for at least 10 years (StarOffice, OpenOffice.org, now LibreOffice), but apparently (and I don't remember when this happened or whether it was always like that), at present one has to manually redefine the particular Query each time the mailmerge is used.

I would hasard a guess that this actually stopped working (i.e. having a query referenced within the mailmerge template or the configuration parameters) when Sun/Oracle redesigned the mailmerge wizard (sometime in the 3.x development branch I think). Of course, it could actually be a LO bug, I haven't compared versions to see whether it works in the one (e.g. OOo 3.2.1) and not the other (LO 3.3.x).

Alex

#25

Am 03.02.2012 11:30, Alex Thurgood wrote:

I would hasard a guess that this actually stopped working (i.e. having a
query referenced within the mailmerge template or the configuration
parameters) when Sun/Oracle redesigned the mailmerge wizard (sometime in
the 3.x development branch I think). Of course, it could actually be a
LO bug, I haven't compared versions to see whether it works in the one
(e.g. OOo 3.2.1) and not the other (LO 3.3.x).

Alex

Hi Alex,
I just tested OOo 2.4.3. Same thing. The mail merge dialog does not catch the current mail merge record set that is correctly identified in dialog Edit>ExchangeDatabase...

#26

Hi Andreas,

Hi Alex,
I just tested OOo 2.4.3. Same thing. The mail merge dialog does not
catch the current mail merge record set that is correctly identified in
dialog Edit>ExchangeDatabase...

Thanks for testing, OOo 2.4.3 is going back a bit in time...
So an unimplemented feature then ? I remember with StarOffice 5.x and OpenOffice.org 1.x, the SDB files contained clickable links to the Queries (the properties of which could be edited, as I recall) which meant that you didn't have to worry about assigning the query each time. Seems that that possibility was lost when the StarDesktop functionality was removed and Base 2.0 was developed.

Alex

#27

Am 03.02.2012 15:35, Alex Thurgood wrote:

Thanks for testing, OOo 2.4.3 is going back a bit in time...
So an unimplemented feature then ? I remember with StarOffice 5.x and
OpenOffice.org 1.x, the SDB files contained clickable links to the
Queries (the properties of which could be edited, as I recall) which
meant that you didn't have to worry about assigning the query each time.

The links pointed to regular office doucments somehow related to the database. This could be spreadsheets and text documents with input forms and output tables (reports) or may be some documentation file.
SQL queries were stored in the profile data together with the connection settings. The whole concept was so much better than todays "Base documents" which in most cases store nothing but configuration data and confuse the majority of users.
The advantages of stand-alone forms and reports are obvious.

Seems that that possibility was lost when the StarDesktop functionality
was removed and Base 2.0 was developed.

Alex

I installed 1.1.5 and gave a try. A serial letter with a few fields from the Bibliography.biblio table is printable without selecting the source table before printing.
When I drop some fields from a query I have to select the query again in the print dialog. Same annoyance as in 2.x and 3.x.
It looks like something that has been built many years ago and remained unfinished.

#28

Hi Andreas,

When I drop some fields from a query I have to select the query again in
the print dialog. Same annoyance as in 2.x and 3.x.
It looks like something that has been built many years ago and remained
unfinished.

Hmm, well it is unlikely to be improved in the near future then if it
has been missing for over 10 years and no one at Sun, then Oracle,
thought it was worthwhile improving on. It is always worth filing a
request for enhancement I guess, but probably won't be a priority for
the developers currently involved in Base maintenance/development.

Alex

#29

Hi,

Have you with the stock 3.5RC2? No, I'm not being factitious or
disrespectful... but you keep claiming that this all works with your own
build from Master& I'd appreciate an answer.

It even works for me with :
LibreOffice 3.4.5
OOO340m1 (Build:502)

You didn't answer my question.

Provided by Ubuntu from the Oneiric repositories.

I clicked on Other external data source, then Parameters, and chose
Spreadsheet. It appears to work fine, as in I can thereafter press F4,
select a tuple from the table, copy it into a Writer document, the merge
data wizard starts up, and I can choose how I want the data merged.

File a bug report. That distro version is missing other data source
parameters. Further, on a new Ubuntu 11.10 install from the Ubuntu
repositories, clicking on 'Other external data source' results in:

"The connection to the external data source source could not be
established. No SDBC driver was found."

and clicking on 'More" results in the standard
sdbc:addresss:evolution:local.

LibreOffice 3.4.5
OOO340m1 (Build:502)

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