Create Merge using conditional properties - if Sub.ID1 = Sub.ID2 then insert Next Record App.1 (App.Co.1), if not then go to next Sub.ID and repeat the process

Question

So I need to create a document that looks like this:

______ Submission Type Sub Number, “Title”, By: Author 1 (Author Co. 1), Author 2 (Author Co. 2), Author 3 (Author Co. 3), Author 4 (Author Co. 4)

Monitor: Name

________ Next Submission Type Number, "Title", By: Author 1 (Author Co. 1), Author 2 (Author Co. 2), Author 3 (Author Co. 3), Author 4 (Author Co. 4)

Monitor: Name

or

______ Tutorial 1, "Why Dogs Rule", By: Lemony Snicket (Evil Inc.), J.K. Rowling (Hogwarts Anonymous)

______ Tutorial 2, "Why Cats are better", By: J.R.R. Tolkein (Middle Earth, LLC), George R. R. Martin (DragonsRUs)

My information comes out of the system in an excel like this:

Date	Type	Number	Title	Author Type	Author Name	Author Company
12.6.13	Tutorial	1	Why Dogs Rule	Author	Lemony Snicket	Evil Inc
12.6.13	Tutorial	1	Why Dogs Rule	Co-Author	J.K. Rowling	Hogwarts Anonymous
12.22.16	Tutorial	2	Why Cats are better	Author	J.R.R. Tolkein	Middle Earth, LLC
12.22.16	Tutorial	2	Why Cats are better	Co-Author	George R. R. Martin	DragonsRUs

Is there a way to do this in one fatal swoop and not have to erase a bunch of redundant information?

If not, what would a better excel sheet look like that could create a merge document like I need?

Answer 1

You can create a document of the type that you describe by using the Many to One facility on my Merge Tools Add-in.

You can download the MERGE TOOLS ADD-IN.zip file from the following page of my One Drive:

http://bit.ly/1hduSCB

Then extract the files from the archive and read

“READ ME – Setting up and using the Merge Tools Add-in.docx

to see how to install and use the various tools. 

Using those tools, it is possible to perform the following types of merge that cannot be done with Mail Merge “out-of-the-box”:

• Merge to e-mail messages either with or without attachments, with the documents created by the merge being sent as either Word or PDF attachments or as the body of the e-mail message.
• Merge to individual documents in either Word or PDF format with the filenames being supplied by the data in one of the fields in the data source
• Many to One type merges, which can be used for creating documents such as invoices where there are multiple records in the data source that have common data in one of the fields
• Merging to a document that will include a chart that is unique to each record in the data source
• Merging a document with Content Controls
• Merging a document that contains Legacy FormFields
• Duplex Merges
• Merging to a printer that will collate and staple the output created from each record in the data source.

Answer 2

You can use Word's Catalogue/Directory Mailmerge facility for this (the terminology depends on the Word version). To see how to do so with any mailmerge data source supported by Word, check out my Microsoft Word Catalogue/Directory Mailmerge Tutorial at:

http://windowssecrets.com/forums/showthread.php/154370-Microsoft-Word-Catalogue-Directory-Mailmerge-Tutorial

or:

http://www.gmayor.com/Zips/Catalogue%20Mailmerge.zip

The tutorial covers everything from list creation to the insertion & calculation of values in multi-record tables in letters. Do read the tutorial before trying to use the mailmerge document included with it.

The field coding for this is complex. However, since the tutorial document includes working field codes for all of its examples, most of the hard work has already been done for you - you should be able to do little more than copy/paste the relevant field codes into your own mailmerge main document, substitute/insert  your own field names and adjust the formatting to get the results you desire. For some worked examples, see the attachments to the posts at:

http://www.msofficeforums.com/mail-merge/9180-mail-merge-duplicate-names-but-different-dollar.html#post23345

http://www.msofficeforums.com/mail-merge/11436-access-word-creating-list-multiple-records.html#post30327

Alternatively, you may want to try one of the Many-to-One Mail Merge add-ins, from:

Graham Mayor at http://www.gmayor.com/ManyToOne.htm; or

Doug Robbins at http://bit.ly/1hduSCB

but I'm not sure whether either of those can layout the data in a linear fashion.