Hi Sandra,

To clarify: do I insert the IF fields 20 times (including the appropriate
paragraph wording) into the Main document?

Yes, it is tedious, but I think it is the simplest approach.

The reason I have used this layout

{ IF "{ MERGEFIELD para1 \*Upper }" = "Y" "para 1 text here" ""
}{ IF "{ MERGEFIELD para2 \*Upper }" = "Y" "para 2 text here" ""
}

is because it does not generate a new paragraph (or carriage return) when
the "IF" field evaluates as "false" or "no".

Also, where it says "para 1 text
here" "" do I insert my text "If you have contributed to ............" ""
retaining as many quotation marks?

Yes. If I said

{ IF "{ MERGEFIELD para1 \*Upper }" = "Y" "para 1 text here" ""
}
but you need to say

If you have contributed to ............

use

{ IF "{ MERGEFIELD para1 \*Upper }" = "Y" "If you have contributed to
............." ""
}

The second "" is the empty text that is inserted if { MERGEFIELD para1 } is
not equal to "Y".

If your text contains double-quote characters, you may need to do a bit more
than that.

I suggest you try doing your merge to a new document, whcih will allow you
to check your output without printing anything or sending any e-mails.

Peter Jamieson

Peter Jamieson wrote:
I can't think of any way to link the individual paragraphs to each
member's
record in the database to enable me to merge. Is this possible?

There are various ways you could approach this, depending on the precise
requirements.

Broadly speaking, if I were doing it, I would probably try to put most of
my
effort into getting the data correct:
a. add twenty fields/columns to my database, one for each different
paragraph
b. ensure that each record in my database specified the correct
paragraphs
c. use { IF } fields in my Word MailMerge Main document to include or
exclude each paragraph, e.g. if the fields are named
para1,para2,...,para20
and each field contains "Y" to include the paragraph, "" or "N" otherwise:

{ IF "{ MERGEFIELD para1 \*Upper }" = "Y" "para 1 text here" ""
}{ IF "{ MERGEFIELD para2 \*Upper }" = "Y" "para 2 text here" ""
}{ IF "{ MERGEFIELD para3 \*Upper }" = "Y" "para 3 text here" ""
}

and so on, where all the {} are the special field code braces you can
insert
using ctrl-F9.

If, on the other hand, you really have to do this stuff on an ad-hoc
basis,
you could use ASK fields to prompt the user for information about which
paragraphs to include, and test the results. However, in my view that's
asking for trouble.

Peter Jamieson

I currently have a database holding details of 400+ members.

[quoted text clipped - 21 lines]

Sandra

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