S R Computer Institute

(Part-2)

Mail Merge

Mail Merge is a very important feature of word processor. It is used to create a series of same documents with multiple addresses. Mail merge is the process of merging the main document (letter or certificates) with the mailing address of various persons. The main document is merged with the mailing address, hence the name mail merge. It is used to send invitations, letters or to print certificates for several people. For example, if you wish to inform your customers of a new product, then the company information and information about the new product are the same in all the documents, but the

recipient information changes (first name, last name, address, greeting …).

For example, if your principal or class teacher wants to send a letter or notice to your parents regarding any meeting or function, obviously, the matter of the letter will be the same but the addresses will be different for different parents. One way is, to create a letter in Writer, copy the address from address list to change the address of each set of parents and print the letter. The procedure of copying and changing is repeated as many times as the number of parents. This way creating multiple documents becomes very time consuming and tedious. It is not possible if there are hundreds or thousands of addresses. The word processor has a special feature of mail merge . to accomplish this task in one stroke. In mail merge two documents are created. One with the common contents is the main document or form letter and other holding the address list is called the data source

Creating and registering an address data source

A data source is a set of mailing addresses in the form of a rows and columns generally called database. The content of the database is in the form of data records. Each row is a record of each person, which contains the various fields, such as name, address, pin code.

To create an address book using spreadsheet or database is little easier, as they use the table format to store the data. It is also possible to create an address book during the mail merge process using mail merge wizard Using Mail Merge.

1. From within a writer document, or from the LibreOffice start center, choose  File > wizards > Address data source.  

2. The choices on the first page of the wizard very with your operating system . select the appropriate type of external address book. for a spreadsheet, it is other external data source.  Click Next.

3. On the next page of the wizard, click the  Setting button.

4. On the data source properties page, select the database type. In our example, it is  spreadsheet. Click  Next.

5.  On the next page, click  Browse and navigate to the spreadsheet that contains the address  information . select the spreadsheet and  Click  open to return to this dialog. To text that the connection has been correctly established, click to the  Test connection button in the model of the dialog (not shown on illustration).

6. Click  Finish .

7. At step 4 (field Assignment ) of wizard,  click  Next.  Do not  click the field assignment button.

A) Name the new database (.odf) file in the location field. Optionaly change the name in the  Address book name  field;  this is the registered name, which LibreOffice display in data source listings. In our example, The name points was used for both.

B) Click  Finish. The data source is now registered.

Creating a form latter

You can create a form latter manually — The simplest and most comprehensive method, which is discribed here- or you can use the mail merge wizard.

1. Create a new document ( File > new > text document)  or open a pre-existing form letter with  File > Open.
2. Display the registered data sources:  View > Data sources (or press F4)
3. Find the data source that you wish to use for the form letter, in this case points expand the points and Table folders, and select sheet1. The address data file is dispalyed.

4) Now create or modify the form letter by typing in the text, punctuation, line breaks, and so on that will be present in all of the letters. To add the mail-merge fields where needed (such as names and address), click in the field heading and drag it to the appropriate point in the letter. note that address lines should lines should be in individual paragraphs, not separated by line breaks as might seem preferable. The reason for this will be made clear in the next step.

5) Continue until you have composed the entire document. At this time you can suppress any blank lines that may appear in the resulting letters (step 6). Otherwise, go to step 7.

6) To suppress blank line:

A) Click at the end of the first paragraph to be suppressed if empty, and then chose  Insert > Field > More Fields to display the fields dialog.

B) select the functions tab and then click on the  Hidden paragraph  in the type column.

C) Now click in the  Condition  Box and enter the details of the condition that defines a blank address field. It has the general form of:

D) Click  Insert  But do not close the dialog until you have amended all the lines that should be suppressed.

7) The document is note ready to be printed .

A) Choose  File > Print  and respond with  Yes  In the message box.

B) In the mail merge dialog you can choose to print all records to selected records. To select record to be printed, use CTRL+ CLICK to select individual records. to select a block of records, select the first record in the block , scroll to the last record in the block, and SHIFT+ CLICK on the last record

C) Click  OK  to send the letters directly to the printer. or, you can save the letters to a file for further editing or formatting see ” editing merged documents” Below.

D) If you have not saved the original, prototype form letter document (template) previously, then you should do show now . Having a form letter template could greatly simplify the creation of other form letters and is highly recommended.

Using the mail merge wizared to create a form letter

The manual method of creating a form letter is to use the mail merge wizared, the technique is discribed below.

Open a new document with  File > New > Text Document  And start the mail merge wizard using Tools > mail merge wizard .

 Step 1: Select starting document –   The wizard gives serval options for the starting document. For the purposes of this example, we assume that you opened a new text document. Select  Use the current document  and click  Next.

Step 2: Select document type –  The wizard can produce letters or email messages. In this example, we are producing a letter. select  LETTER  and click NEXT.

Step 3: Insert addres block –  This is the most complex step in the wizard. In this step you will do three things:

Selecting the data source (address list)

A) If the current address list, identified beneath the  Select Different Address List button in selection 1, is not the one you wish to use, click the button to open the select Address List dialog for choosing a data source .

If you have not already created the address list , you may click  create to do show now. This step will allow you to create a .csv (comma separated value) file with a new list of address records. If you have an address kist that is not registered in Libreoffice, but which you wish to use, click  Add and select the file form the location in which it is saved.

In each of these cases a new data source (.odb file) will be created and registered.

B)  Select the address list and click  OK  to return to step 3 of the wizard. we retain “points” as our address book for the example. The wizard can also exclude certain records; click  Filter  To choose them.

Selecting The address block

1.  In section 2 select the address block to appear on the letter, define its appearance, and choose the fields it contains. The main page gives two choices. click  More  to open the select Address block dialog for more choices.
2. The select address block dialog display the original two blocks plus other choices for the format of the address block (you may need to scroll down to see all of the choices). Select the address block that is closest to what you want and click edit, Which opens the Edit address block dialog.
3.  In the edit address block dialog you can add or delete address elements using the arrow buttons on the left. To move elements around, use the arrow buttons on the right. Click <Surname> and click the right arrow button.

Matching the fields-  Finally, it is time to match the wizard’s fields with the spreadsheet fields, so that items like < Surname> and ‘ last name’ match correctly.

If the address do not display correctly , click  Match fields.  The Match fields dialog has three columns:

• Address Elements are the terms the wizard uses for each field, such as <Forename> and <surname>.
• Use the matches to field column to select, for each address element, the field from your data source that matches it.
• The preview column shows what will be shown for this field from the selected address block, so you can double- check that the match is correct.

When you have matched all the fields, click  OK to return to step 3 of the wizard.

Step 4: Create salutation- It is possible to create just about any salutation you want in this step .

Select  this document should contain a salutation to enable the General salutation list box. some general texts available in the list box, or you can enter own text. A preview pane display your choice. Select Insert Personalized salutation to enable  further salutation constructs.

As an example:

1. Click the  New Button alongside the male list box. The Custom salutation (male recipients ) dialog opens.
2. Select salutation in the salutation elements listings.
3. Click the arrow buttons to add it to box 1.
4. Open the list box choices for box 2 select an appropriate greeting or type your own text into the list box. Edit it as needed.
5. Select and move across First name from the salutation elements listing into box 1.
6. Type a spece and then move Last name Across.
7. Finally, move punctuation Mark across and select the comma from the choices in box 2.
8. The construct is shown in the preview box.
9. Carry out final editing . Click OK.

This method allows you to use gender neutral titles such as Doctor (Dr) and Reverend (Rev), or title such as Ms or omit titles.

Step 5: Adjust layout- In step 5, you can adjust the position of the address block and salutation on the page. you can place the address block anywhere on the page. The salutation is always on the left, but you can move it up and down the page. Use the buttons to move the elements.

 Step 6: Edit document and insert extra fields – In step 6 you have another opportunity to exclude particular recipients from the mail merge, You can also edit the body of the document. If you started with a blank document , You can write the whole letter in this step. Click  Edit Document To shrink the wizard to a small window so you can easily edit the letter.

You need to perform another important task in this step .The wizard only inserts information from the name and address

To do this:

1. Click Edit Document  In step 6 of the wizard.
2. Choose  Insert > Fields > Other Fields.  The dialog opens.
3. Click the Database tab.
4. On the left hand side, select mail merge fields.
5. Under Database Selection find your data source ( in this example , it is points 0. Expand it to see the fields.
6. Click the field you want to insert ( points), Then click Insert to insert the field .
7. You can  Insert any number of fields any number of times into your mail merge document.
8. Click close when you are done.

 Step 7 : Personalize documents-  This step Creates all your latters, one per recipient . Clicking the  Edit individual document   Button here is similar to step 6. The differense is a that you now edit a long file containing all of the letters, You can make changes to a particular letter to one person. In this step of the mail merge wizard, Click Find to open a dialog that allows searches within the document , Perhaps for an individual addressee.

As with step 6, When editing the document, the wizard shrink to a small window . Click on this window to expand the wizard to its full size.

Step 8: Save and print or send- You have now completed the mail merge process. In step 8 , You can save the original sample letter, save the merged document, print the letters right away or , if you created email messages, sent them.

The merged document can now be save by selecting  Save merged document . This will reveal the save merged document settings section, from which you can select to save either as one large file containing all tha idividual, generated letters or as a separated file for each letter.

When you have saved the merged   document, You can print the final letters now or letter ; and you can still manually check and edit the letters if necessary. If you select to print at this stage , the Dialog box appears, Which is self – Explanatory.              

MCQ Chapter-2	MCQ Chapter -1	LibreOffice Writer All Shortcut Keys
Chapter-2	Chapter-1	LibreOffice Writer MCQ