One of the FM 8 ads said something about exporting data as Excel as well as
Word files.

I currently use FM 7.03, and I need to set up an output that I can copy and
paste, from Word if possible. A merge form letter is not copyable directly
from FM 7.

Am I mssing something in FM 7.03 to do this, or will FM 8 be the answer?

David Robins, MD wrote:
Using an XML export with the proper XSLT stylesheet will allow you to
export data into a format that Word can use -- even in 7.

FM8 has 'Save as Excel' and 'Save as PDF' functions, but there is no
such function for 'Save as Word'.

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~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Howard Schlossberg (818) 883-2846
FM Pro Solutions Los Angeles, California

FileMaker 7 Certified Developer
Associate Member, FileMaker Solutions Alliance

In article <11hfpmflrgolcee (AT) corp (DOT) supernews.com>,
Howard Schlossberg <howard (AT) antispahm (DOT) fmprosolutions.com> wrote:

There are several ways to accomplish what I think you want to do.

One is to export data in a form that can be opened in Word. Tab Text,
HTML, XML can be made to work.

Another is to create a calculation field that concatenates data from
several fields, with appropriate additional text and separators if
needed, then copy and paste the contents of that field into Word.

Another is to use FileMaker directly to set up the letter or other
document you currently think you want to prepare in Word, as follows:

You can do a batch mail-merge form letter directly in FileMaker. Set up
a new layout in your main contact table that is the mail-merge letter.
Set up the fixed text in the layout mode, in the format you want. Insert
the desired Merge fields, for name, address, etc, plus any specific
merge data you want merged into the body of the letter. You can then
print the mail merge letters for any selected group of records, sorted
in any desired order. You can also make layouts for envelopes or mailing
labels in the Contact table, and print those.

You can do individual letters to people on your mailing list (not a
batch mail-merge form letter). Set up a new Table for individual
letters, with fields for ContactID, Date and LetterText. relate that to
the Contact table by ContactID, and allow creation of Letter records via
the relationship. Make a new layout in the Contacts table to show
related Letters in a portal. Make a layout in the Letters table to show
the letter in the format you want to print. Include merge fields for
name, address, etc, taken from the related Contact table in the Letter
layout. Include navigation pushbuttons in both of those layouts to show
related records. Now you can create a letter to the individual in the
Letter portal in the Contact record for that individual, then go to the
related Letter record to finish it up and print it. You simply enter the
body text of the letter in the LetterText field by typing it in the
Browse mode, with appropriate carriage returns, desired font and size,
etc. You can also make an Envelope layout in the Letter table, that uses
Merge fields from the Contacts table, to print an envelope for the
letter.

FileMaker has pretty good word processing capabilities, certainly good
enough to do a letter in one of the ways described above. To do letters,
you do not need to use Word at all. If you are trying to do something
more elaborate than a letter, which needs the more sophisticated word
processing capabilities of Word, then you will need to use one of the
export or copy and paste methods I described first.

Bill Collins

--
For email, remove invalid.

Bill <bbcollins (AT) invalid (DOT) earthlink.net> wrote:

Saw a demo of this in one of the DevCon sessions I attended.

It worked a treat. Ended up with a formatted table report, with table
cells containing info from both parent records and multiple child
records.

Apparently, building the report in Word, saving as XML, and then turning
that document into an XSLT style sheet by replacing the appropriate
elements with the coding for including the db info isn't that hard.

Lynn Allen
--
Allen & Allen Semiotics www.semiotics.com
FSA Associate Filemaker Design & Consulting

Lynn allen <lynn (AT) NOT-semiotics (DOT) com> wrote:

surely, but when the point is sending a letter, a mix of formatted
merged text, global fields and data fields can make the job in a
cheapest, quicker and usually easiest way.
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Philippe Manet