Merge Fields

[David Jondreau]

Can someone give me a rundown on merge fields? I've just discovered them and aside from putting them on printing layouts and avoiding extensive text calculations I'm wondering how else they are used.

Are they acceptable for ANY field that doesn't require entry? Are they 'faster' than standard calculation fields? (I use a database that's hosted over the Internet and a couple layouts are calculation heavy and take awhile to load). What do YOU use them for?

Thanks in advance,

G

[Søren Dyhr]

Are they 'faster' than standard calculation fields?

Weird question, they often reflect values in calcfields, but by and large are they a layouting measure, originally intended to make a fields value show up in test, so letters can be personalized.

But their ability to push the following text further to the right depending on the lenght of the mergefield, can be utilized in graphing, because you tie two mergefields together into a single string.

The word in the first string recieves the colour itentical to the background the second <> could contain a dingbat or similar graphical elements, so by putting data of variuos lenght in the first part of of the train, make the positioning of the second happen in more positions - I use this for building gantt charts.

--sd

[Inky Phil]

As Soren implied, to ask whether a merge field is faster than a calc field means that your understanding of merge fields is possibly different to mine.

To me a merge field is any field (calc or otherwise) that can be inserted into a text box so as to allow the text to flow around it - hence 'merge'.

This avoids the clunky, disjointed look you can get if you have to leave space for say a maximum possible 10 character field when the minimum possible might be 1 character.

Hence Dear Mr Smith please contact...... is as smooth a display as Dear Mrs Hetherington-Smythe please contact.... where the Title and surname are both merge fields.

One tip when adding merge fields to your layouts. They can get a bit long once inserted because the table and field name is all included.

To set the display characteristics of the merge field only the first chevron needs the characteristics to be set. The rest of the characters in the merge field can be reduced in point size to reduce the clutter on the screen when in layout mode but the displayed result (in any other mode than layout) will be that of the the characteristics set in the first chevron.

One caveat when using merge fields is to do with number formatting. You can only apply one number format to any one block of text. If you have 2 number merge fields, one of which you wish to display as currency to 2 decimal places and another one that is not currency and you wish to round up to it's integer you cannot include both of these in the same text block.

You will have to come up with an alternative answer and believe me once you start doing this your layouts can become pretty messy when in layout mode.

Other than that enjoy your merge fields - they are your friend!

HTH

Phil

[David Jondreau]

I hope your understanding of merge fields is different than mine...as I have little understanding of them at all!

Until now I'd been tryingto achieve a 'smooth' look by either heavy use of sliding and aligning edges or complex text calculations. I'm glad to have merge fields to work with.

Thanks for your comments.

G

[Søren Dyhr]

You need to learn hessitation every time something tiresom occures, often is it because you owe no strategy to approach the matter, that you fall in the ditch and fool youself into beliving "hard work" etc. Step back and make a plan!

Throwing in a lot of global fields and complex calc'fields into a solution is actually a departure from relational approaches and the database realm, which is much better applied to spreadsheets. I often use the metaphor to discripe this - the urge to make french fries with a smashing tennisracket, you should humble yourself to recognize what the gist of the tool really is, instead of forcing the tool and yourself into another realm.

There is an interesting article in Scentific American, cached here:

http://209.85.135.104/search?q=cache:eM0oKLM0d3YJ:www.sciam.com/article.cfm%3FchanID%3Dsa006%26colID%3D1%26articleID%3D00010347-101C-14C1-8F9E83414B7F4945+%22the+expert+mind%22&hl=da&ct=clnk&cd=1&client=safari

...see how much you can extract without paying??

--sd

[Søren Dyhr]

Here's something to take your mergefields into the stratosphere of ingenuity:

http://edoshin.skeletonkey.com/2005/11/merge_expressio.html

--sd