Reports or mail merge? (A2k)

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Looking for opinions. I need to create letters from info stored in my access database. I don’t want users to have to open the word documents and then go to the access database and input query parameters. I have a form from which a user will select a class number. Then they will click a button to create the letters for the entire class. I need to loop through the records, since different types of students require different letters. I’m just looking for general opinions, specifics will come later.

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Both mail merge in Word and reports in Access should work. I don’t know how different the letters will be – if they share a common basis, you might be able to use one mail merge document / report, with conditional parts. If they are fundamentally different, you’ll need to use code to select the appropriate document or report for each student. Both options can be fully automated. You should choose mail merge if the letters may need to be edited manually, or need to be stored as documents.

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Hans,
Thanks for the additional considerations. How can I avoid getting the query prompt when calling the word document from access? And how do I call the word doc from access? What additional considerations should I have since it’s a mail merge document?

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You can use DDE to connect to the database; this will recognize form parameters in a query.

I usually store the Word document without data source (ActiveDocument.MailMerge.MainDocumentType = wdNotAMergeDocument), and create it on the fly using Automation. See post 263,603 and post 375,939 for examples. This approach is very flexible, and has been working well in many databases for over 6 years now.

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Ok, last question: would it be possible to embed the word documents in the database and call them from there?

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No, that’s not a good idea. I’d store them separately; if you put them in the same folder as the database (or a subfolder of that folder, if you prefer), the database can always find them.

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What’s the code to look in the folder the database is in?

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You can use CurrentProject.Path to retrieve the path to the current database.

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