I want to generate documents using a selection of Mail Merge Word templates and a selection of Excel data sources. So ideally there will be a custom drop down the user can use to select the desired template and another custom drop down where the user can select the desired data source and generate the documents. It is the user's responsibility to have the template configured in advance with the correct fields as per the selected data source.

So in summary, what I want to do is to add custom buttons, drop downs to Microsoft word (Or a custom form that can be loaded using a button on the ribbon bar) that will enable the user to load up templates to a drop down from a given directory using a file open dialog box, and to load up data sources to another drop down using a file open dialog box and then a generate button to generate documents according to the selected data source and the template.

I'm a developer but new to VBA. Appreciate if someone can point me in the right direction with some sample code or a better way of doing this. The solution has to be simple enough for a non IT person to generate documents using different templates and data sources selected using a drop downs.

Thanks in advance,


Kind Regards,
Dushan

That makes having a macro rather pointless, since the user has to open & configure the mailmerge main document before they can use it (including adding any mergefields, filters, etc. - which requires connecting to the data source) and, once they've done that, they may as well complete the merge then & there.

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]

Thank you so much for your valuable time taken for this.

Actually the templates are not varying over time. They have only 3 fixed templates. Think of these as standard certificates for a school. And the data source is the same for all three, although I made it slightly flexible by loading data sources to a different drop down.

Only that they need to choose one out of three templates each time. So initially the admin can do a manual mail merge to generate these three templates and save them in a directory so that the user does not have to go though the process again.

It is for saving time and to reduce complexity for non IT users.

Surely, all the users need do, then, is pin the three mailmerge main documents to Word's recent file list???

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]