Do we have a Word, Excel, Access Guru here?

I have a client who is asking about what I believe a combination of Word and Excel with Access might have the ability to do.

He is a commercial appraisal who has a template that consists of something like 50 pages that he uses to do his reports. He has basic information that repeats itself many times over in his document. He would like to enter this information once and have it post into his template without having to do a search and replace. He also has a spreadsheet too in this report and wants to be able to do the same.

The question is first, can these products do what he is looking to do and second, if so, how can he do this? I believe there is a linking feature to this package.

Thanks to all who help out.
Craig

 

When you say template, do you mean an Excel spreadsheet with that many pages? If so, you can link a cell to other cells in the workbook. (ie, enter a number once, and automatically update everywhere else) You'll need to tell us more about this template for us to offer help. Right now, I don't have a solid idea of what it is....

 

I'm sorry, no, this is a Word document he is using as his template. He has Office Pro 2003.

 

Okay...there is a way to link data in Word, too. However, I'm not certain how its done. I can point you in the right direction, though, and that is the help files. I remember reading a help page on how that was done. Try searching help for 'linking and embedding', and I'm confident you'll find an answer.

 

I think you can use the Access database to fill out a Mail Merge on the word document (under tool > letters and mailings menu) Simply follow the wizard and it's fairly self explanatory. Not sure about a second merge using the Excel sheet though .

 

I'm not sure that he wants a mail merge type of thing, its has many fields he wants to enter and have the whole document reflect, and the Excel thing is another thing too.

Thanks for your input and please, keep coming with your ideas.

Let me know if there's a link that I can find this info too.

 

I found the help file online. Please see this link for directions on how to link and embed data in Word.

 

This can be done with what is called “OLE” (Object Linking and Embedding). Open M$ word, go to help, select “Microsoft Office Word Help”, type “embed excel document” in the box and hit enter. The first result that comes up will explain in detail how to achieve this. Good Luck!

 

Thank you AMH, that's what I've been trying to explain...do you know whether this can be done inside a single word document?... My memory/intuition is telling me it can be, but I really don't want to send this poor fellow on a wild goose chase if I'm wrong...

 

You guys have been great. I'll check the link later tonight and see what I can learn.

I agree, my intuition says that you can do what this appraisers is looking to do. I am thinking that MS Office has some kind of dynamic linking but just can't find the documentation.

Thanks again.
Craig

 

a 50 page word doc is huge. However for the graph you will Import the excel spreadsheet into access. create a new table for the word doc data. Most important both tables will need a common data field to create a join like the customers name or the customer number. This will allow you to create a form that will include both tables for a simple one window data input be sure to insert a command button on the form to run the query after all the data has been entered.

create a query that will isolate only the data needed to be printed this will be your data source for a mail merge in word.

Open word and create a mail merge using the standard doc template you will need to follow the instructions carefully this will allow you to insert the necessary fields within the doc as needed and should be saved so that when the mail merge doc is opened again and again you only need to run the merge and print. The graph will need to be created in the doc so you can link the doc table and it will update as the data updates.

You will then have a form in access, and a mail merge doc

 

Thanks jewlzs for your input. As I understand from your reply i would be using Access as a form to be filled out and then merged to the Word document. This would include similar fields that would be present in various points in his 50 page report. The tables would need to have formulas to calculate the information. Is that possible using Access? From there I would then save the Word doc for each report that this client creates. He wants to use this form over and over for the different assignments he receives.