I am sending emails to people in my database telling them the mailing address we have is incorrect. I want to include the "fields" that refer to that address in the email so they will see what address, city, state we were using. I cannot figure out how to insert these fields with the correct operators around them so i can have each email customized for that person in the database.

Here is a sample of the email i am sending.

DNNUserExport Converted::firstname& ":¶" &

"x organization is verifying snail mail addresses. We sent mail to this address and it was returned to us." ¶¶

DNNUserExport Converted::address1

DNNUserExport Converted::city

DNNUserExport Converted::state

DNNUserExport Converted::postalcode

"Thank you very much.¶¶

¶MY Name

¶Membership Director

¶x organization

¶[email protected]

¶1966-1968"

What do i put around these fields so they get filled in with the correct field. I was successful in FM Pro 7 but am totally stuck in 11.. And i am a NOVICE..

thank you so much.

Janice

Hi Janice,

the secret is to put nothing around the field names as opposed to the text constants.

See if this modified version works for you. You may need to fiddle a bit with the number of carriage returns.

Not sure about the final paragraph. If it's a constant, put in quotes, otherwise don't. Make sure there's always one “&”

between each bit.

DNNUserExport Converted::firstname & ":¶" &

"x organization is verifying snail mail addresses. We sent mail to this address and it was returned to us.¶¶" &

DNNUserExport Converted::address1 & "¶"

DNNUserExport Converted::city & "¶"

DNNUserExport Converted::state & "¶"

DNNUserExport Converted::postalcode & "¶"

"Thank you very much.¶¶"

& "¶¶"

& MY Name

&"¶"

& Membership Director

& "¶"

& x organization

& "¶"

& [email protected]

& "¶1966-1968"

What do i put around these fields so they get filled in with the correct field. I was successful in FM Pro 7 but am totally stuck in 11.. And i am a NOVICE..

thank you so much.

Janice

A little aside, single paragraph symbols don't require quotes.

thanks... So i copied what you had and now i get this message..

"An operator (e.g. +, -, *, …) is expected here." this message shows where i put the red/underline

DNNUserExport Converted::address1 & "¶"

DNNUserExport Converted::city & "¶"

DNNUserExport Converted::state & "¶"

DNNUserExport Converted::postalcode & "¶"

i can get the rest of the email to work.. just these inserted fields.

thanks

thanks... So i copied what you had and now i get this message..

"An operator (e.g. +, -, *, …) is expected here." this message shows where i put the red/underline

DNNUserExport Converted::address1 & "¶"

DNNUserExport Converted::city & "¶"

DNNUserExport Converted::state & "¶"

DNNUserExport Converted::postalcode & "¶"

i can get the rest of the email to work.. just these inserted fields.

thanks

Oops, yes, as I said, you need to make sure that all the bits are connected via an ampersand (&).

It's easy to forget some … Change the above passage to:

DNNUserExport Converted::address1 & "¶" &

DNNUserExport Converted::city & "¶" &

DNNUserExport Converted::state & "¶" &

DNNUserExport Converted::postalcode & "¶" &

Good luck.

I still get the same error in the same location and i have entered the ampersands. ???

OK, please be so kind and post your newest version of the formula, so we're on the same page.

I was successful in FM Pro 7 but am totally stuck in 11.

There was no change in the way a calculation combines field data with literal text.

---

Well, actually there was one change in version 8.5: instead of =

DNNUserExport Converted::address1 & ¶ &

DNNUserExport Converted::city & ¶ &

DNNUserExport Converted::state & ¶ &

DNNUserExport Converted::postalcode 

you can write =

List (

DNNUserExport Converted::address1 ;

DNNUserExport Converted::city ;

DNNUserExport Converted::state ;

DNNUserExport Converted::postalcode 

)

which has the additional advantage of skipping the entire line when a field is empty.

Will post the formula

DNNUserExport Converted::firstname& ":¶" &

"The xxx organization is verifying snail mail addresses. We sent mail to this address.¶¶

DNNUserExport Converted::address1 & ¶ &

DNNUserExport Converted::city & ¶ &

DNNUserExport Converted::state & ¶ &

DNNUserExport Converted::postalcode

Can you update your snail mail for us? ¶Thank you very much.¶¶

¶MY Name

¶Membership Director

¶the organization

¶[email protected]

¶Amina, Valverde-Mao Group 18

¶1966-1968

¶http://www.xxx.org"

This is what i get when i run that..

My organization is verifying snail mail addresses. We sent mail to this address.

DNNUserExport Converted::address1 &

& DNNUserExport Converted::city &

& DNNUserExport Converted::state &

& DNNUserExport Converted::postalcode Can you update your snail mail for us?

Thank you very much.

I have lengthy explanations and corrections for you , but I suggest you just post your (zipped) database file and let me have a peek inside - syntax errors are much easier to correct when you have the calculation engine at your side.

The database is extensive. Over 3500 personal information entries and lots of "privacy" issues. I cannot provide a zipped database file.

So now what?

Check where your quotes begin and where do they end. Anything between quotes is a literal text. Note that you must have an operator between each element of a formula - see::

http://www.filemaker.com/11help/html/create_db.8.36.html#1030710

BTW, how difficult is it to put together a file of five fields?

Concat.fp7.zip

EDIT: I didn't see the two posts by comment, which as usually hit the nail on the head and (hopefully) make my corrections superfluous.

What you did is exactly what i want to do. I just still don't know what is the operator to insert. I am such a newbie that it is not simple for me.

In this case, since you're merely assembling pieces of text, the only relevant operator is the & (concatenate) operator.