[Gordon Biggar]

Please excuse the delay. Been working in Galveston, attempting to locate
some semblance of sanity...

Typed the formula below into an Excel spreadsheet cell. Program did not
take kindly, but froze up instead. I will implement your other response
shortly.

GGB


"Peter Jamieson" wrote in message
...
Oh, and while we're here you can also see if DDE is working the other way
around, i.e. from Excel, by using a formula like

=WINWORD|SYSTEM!SYSITEMS

(the result is just the /first/ SYSITEM but if Excel can't execute the
command you should see one or more dialog boxes).

--
Peter Jamieson
http://tips.pjmsn.me.uk

"Peter Jamieson" wrote in message
...
OK, if you feel like it there's one other thing you could try, which is
to
try to connect to an application that is neither Word nor Excel, using
DDE. if that works, then there's probably a problem specifically with
Excel configuration - how to fix it, I do not know, but since
re-installing Office does not typically destroy all configuration
informatin for the application, it might be a question of removing a
registry entry and letting Excel rebuild it: it's probably a question
for
the Excel experts.

There are various programs that should respond to DDE requests. I make
all
the suggestions I can think of that involve common windows/office apps
below. When trying to connect to any of them (same with Excel) it's a
good
idea to ensure that the program is started and you have dismissed any
startup dialog boxes. In some case the "program" has probably already
been
started.

Then in Word, change the DDE field as follows:

Change

{ DDE WINWORD SYSTEM SYSITEMS }

to the following:

Some info. from Windows Explorer:
{ DDE FOLDERS APPPROPERTIES }

Info. from MS Access:
{ DDE MSACCESS SYSTEM SYSITEMS }

Info. from MS Query ((NB, if MS Query has been installed on your system
it
will be in the appropriate office folder (same place as WINWORD.EXE) and
will be called MSQRY32.EXE):
{ DDE MSQUERY SYSTEM SYSITEMS }

Info. from Internet Explorer:
{ DDE IEXPLORE WWW_OpenURL http://www.microsoft.com }

Info. from Frontpage:
{ DDE FRONTPAGE SYSTEM SYSITEMS }

--
Peter Jamieson
http://tips.pjmsn.me.uk

"Gordon Biggar" wrote in message
...
My error. I had typed the field into an Excel spreadsheet.

When executing {DDE Excel...., the hourglass appeared, yellow lights
flashed
on the desktop box, and I let it run for 20 minutes. Assuming that it
was
in some sort of loop, I finally shut it down.

Gordon


"Peter Jamieson" wrote in message
...
BTW, I thought I had replied to this - the idea is that you change the
field
code you had in Word, then re-execute it - ie.e. use

{ DDE Excel ... etc.

insead of

{ DDE Winword

(the only reason to have Excel open is that it makes it slightly more
likely
that the DDE field will execute without problems)

Peter Jamieson

"Gordon Biggar" wrote in message
...
For Word, I obtained the results you showed in your message.
However,
in
Excel, control F-9 minimizes the window without producing the
brackets.
Again, this is Office 2000.

GB



"Peter Jamieson" wrote in message
...
On the DDE subject, because DDE is part of Windows rther than
Office,
I
doubt if doing an Office Check and Repair will work, but it may be
worth
trying. Also, did you check the option in Excel-Tools-Options has
not
changed to prevent DDE access to Excel?

There's one test it may be worth doing, which is to start Word,
then
insert
a { DDE } field into a blank Word document as follows:

{ DDE Winword System Sysitems }

(use ctrl-F9 to insert the special {} - everything else is text)

Select the field and use F9 to update it. The result should look
something
like the following . If necessary, use Alt-F9 to see the result.

SYSITEMS TOPICS FORMATS

If that works, it says that DdE is owrking well enough for Word to
be
able
to communicate with itself. If not, DDE is definitely in trouble on
your
system!

If it worked, you can try starting Excel, then using the same
approach
except:

{ DDE Excel System Sysitems }

The result will probably be a bit different in Word 2003, but with
Office
2007 I get:

SysItems Topics Status Formats Selection Protocols
EditEnvItems

Probably worth a shot just to see if it unblocks something for you.

Peter Jamieson

On 01/10/2008 20:49, in article
,
"Gordon Biggar" wrote:

Since I have been unable to solve the DDE problem (refer to Sept.
30
post
below), concerning the use of Excel name and address data files
being
used
by Word merge files, I have created a name and address file
(Header
and
Data) in Word instead. For some reason, this works, whereas
attempts
to
use
an Excel data file does not.

However, two things arise. The Header file that I use is long
enough
that I
cannot view all of the fields on the monitor, and there is no
ability
to
scroll across the page.

Secondly, I do keep numeric information in some of the fields in
the
Data
file, which is why I originally used an Excel-based data file.
Formerly, to
update any data in the Excel data file, I would simply copy the
incoming
data from selected columns in incoming Excel spreadsheets, and
copy
the
data
into the appropriate fields in the name and address spreadsheet.
Is
there a
way that I can take incoming data from Excel spreadsheets and
copy
it
into
the Word name and address file (i.e, the new data file)? Or,
will
I
have to
type it in manually, a laborious process?

Thanks in advance.

Gordon Biggar
Houston, Texas