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Aspose.Words & Office for Mac 2011 & MailMerge Datasource

Aspose.Words Product Family
#1

Dear Aspose team,

i have following problems, I dont know if it’s simple a incovenience of Word for Mac or an aspose problem.

  1. When I create an empty word document with aspose, setting a rtf document as mailmerge datasource with aspose functions and open the word document in Word for Mac 2011 the datasource is ignored completely. Under Word for Windows everything is perfect.

  2. When I set with aspose functions a rtf document as mailmerge datasource to a word document which was onced saved with Word for Windows (no matter what version or doc or docx) and try to open the word document with Word for Mac 2011 it can not regnonize the datasource.

In both cases if I set in Word for Mac 2011 the mailmerge datasource with Word there is no problem and the rtf document is accepted as datasource.

Can you help?

Thanks a lot! Kind regards,

Jens Boeckel
-----------------------------------
Abacus Research AG
Switzerland

#2

Hi Jens,

Thanks for your inquiry and apologise for the delay.

Can you please attach the following files for testing:

The document produced by creating a document and setting the mail merge datasource as RTF using Aspose.Words.
The correct document produced by creating a document in Word for Mac 2011 and setting the mailmerge data source as RTF.

Using these files we can do some further tests.

Thanks,

#3

Dear Adam,

thanks for your reply. The delay doesnt matter.

As attachment of this post you’ll find a zip file containing:

- the word document generated with aspose and set datasource rtf
- the word document created with Word for Mac 2011 and set datasource rtf
- the rtf (.html) document used as datasource

One idea I’ll have is the MappedDataFields we’ll set with the aspose library. It might help you finding the problem.

Kind regards,

Jens Boeckel
------------------------------
Software-Engineer
Abacus Research AG
Switzerland

#4

Hi Jens,

Thanks for your inquiry.

A brief look doesn’t show anything really wrong with the documents. Could you do a few more tests for me?

Would situation #1 work if a different type of data source was used? i.e CSV or something else?
Would things work if a document created in Word for Mac 2011 was loaded into Aspose.Words and the RTF data source set?
If you load a document produced on Word for Windows and try to set the RTF document using Word for Mac, does the output work in Word for Mac?
Thanks,

#5

Hi Adam,

thnx for your reply and I apologize for the long delay of my reply.

to your topics:

  1. csv is slightly better. In an existing document with inserted mailmerge fields the datasource is regnonized. In a brand new document the datasource is not regnonized

  2. Yes that would work but is no option for our solution, because we must set the datasource programmatically.

  3. Document with datasource created in WordForWindows cant be opened in WordForMac because Word save the absolut path of the datasource file and as you surly know the filesystem/structure on Mac is absolutly different. In opposite direction the problem exists as well. So I cant really test the behaviour.

Thanks again! Kind regards,

Jens Boeckel
------------------------------
Software-engineer
Abacus Research AG
Switzerland

#6

Hi Jens,

Thanks for your inquiry.

I have asked the developer responsible for this area to take a look into this issue. We will provide you with some feedback as soon as possible.

I apologise for any delay.

Thanks,

#7

Hi Jens,

Thanks for your patience. The developer has replied and it looks like it’s just a bug of the file formats. Aspose.Words doesn’t seem to be the cause of the issue.

Will you be able to work around this problem on your side e.g by using 1) in my message above?

Thanks,

#8

Hi Adam,

sorry for the looong delay…

Unfortunately we can not work around the problem with your solution from you. It’s there any news about this topic?

Thanks a lot.

Kind regards,

Jens Boeckel
----------------------
Software-Engineer
Abacus Research AG
Switzerland

#9

Hi
Jens,

Thanks for your request and sorry for the delayed response. We’re checking with your scenario and will get back to you soon.

Best Regards,

#10

Hi Jens,

Thanks for your patience.

Jens:
1) When I create an empty word document with aspose, setting a rtf document as mailmerge datasource with aspose functions and open the word document in Word for Mac 2011 the datasource is ignored completely. Under Word for Windows everything is perfect.

I just tested your scenario with the latest version of Aspose.Words i.e. 11.8.0 on my side and was unable to reproduce this issue on my side. Microsoft Word for MAC 2011 opens the Word documents (DOCX i.e. generated by Aspose.Words) without any problem. Could you please upgrade to the latest version of Aspose.Words and let us know how it goes on your side? You can download it from the following link:
https://releases.aspose.com/words/java

I hope, this will help.

Best Regards,

#11

Hi Jens,

Thank you for contacting me via email. Please contact our sales team in order to get your 30 days temporary license. You can contact them directly in Aspose.Purchase forum below:
https://forum.aspose.com/c/purchase/6

Best Regards,

#12

Dear aspose team,

I just tested the new version of aspose.words (thank you for your support getting a new trial licence! ).

The good news: with docx documents and Word for Mac 2013 everything is perfect. the bad news -
with doc there are still two issues:

  1. if a doc document gets a mailmerge datasource and it is opened with word for mac a dialog comes up that the columnscount of values and headers in datasource does not match (but the columncounts are identical). If I set the datasource in word for mac manually after the warning occured, everything is fine. After that I can set the datasource with aspose and it still works. I saw that the document saved with word for mac is about 10K bigger than the original document (18K).

  2. The preview of the mailmerge field /the mapping of datafields does not work anymore after setting the datasource manually.

I attached the doc documents
- before opening with word for mac
- after saving it with word

Maybe you can find out the difference and solve the problem

Thanks a lot!
Kind regards!

#13

Hi Jens,

Thanks for the additional information. I will further look into the details of this problem and will keep you informed of my findings the earliest possible.

Best Regards,

#14

Hi Jens,

Thanks for your patience. I managed to reproduce the issue you mentioned in your first point on my side. I have logged this issue in our bug tracking system. The issue ID is WORDSNET-7122. Your request has been linked to this issue and you will be notified as soon as it is resolved. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Best Regards,

#15

The issues you have found earlier (filed as WORDSNET-7122) have been fixed in this .NET update and this Java update.

This message was posted using Notification2Forum from Downloads module by aspose.notifier.
#16

Dear aspose team,

unfurtunatly I must tell you that the problem still exists on 13.1.

If you want to open the with aspose 13.1 prepared doc-template with OfficeForMac the datasource is not regnonized and the fields disappear.

Please could you recheck the solution again?

Thanks a lot!
Cheers

#17

Hi Jens,

Thanks for your feedback on this issue. I have attached a DOC file here for your reference. This file was generated by using the following code snippet with Aspose.Words for .NET version 13.1.0.

Document doc = new Document(@"C:\Temp\serienbrief_20106949310905541669501.doc");
doc.MailMergeSettings.Clear();
string rtfDs = @"C:\Temp\serienbrief_20106062451152841554548.html";
MailMergeSettings mms = doc.MailMergeSettings;
mms.DataSource = rtfDs;
mms.MainDocumentType = MailMergeMainDocumentType.FormLetters;
mms.DataType = MailMergeDataType.TextFile;
mms.LinkToQuery = true;
mms.ViewMergedData = true;
mms.Query = "SELECT * FROM " + mms.DataSource;
doc.Save(@"C:\Temp\out.doc");

Could you please open this document with Word for MAC on your side and let us know of your findings. In case any error message appears, please create a screenshot of your problem and attach it here for further testing. Thanks for your cooperation.

Best regards,

#18

Hi Awais,

I had to setup a corresponding rtf-datasource file to be able to open the document on Windows. With it I could open the out.doc on Windows.
So I copied out.doc and the corresponding datasource file to a MAC. I tried to open it with MS WordForMac 11. Unfortunately the datasource is not regnonized. (see printscreen 1.jpg).
After pressing ok, the dialog in printscreen 1a.jpg is occuring.

Another try in our mailmerge program produces the printscreens 2.jpg, 3.jpg and 4.jpg on Mac and MS WordForMac.

I’m curious why the problems only occur with doc. With docx documents we dont have any problems.

Thank you a lot!
Cheers

#19

Hi Jens,

Thanks for the additional and I apologize for not attaching the data source file in my previous post. I have attached the required RTF data source (serienbrief_20106062451152841554548.zip) here for your reference. Please place the RTF file in the folder containing the out.doc document. After this when you open the out.doc with Word for MAC, the problems associated with the screenshots (1.jpg, 1a.jpg, 2.jpg and 3.jpg) would be gone.

However, I still managed to reproduce the problem you mentioned in 4.jpg on my side. For the sake of correction, I have logged this problem in our issue tracking system as WORDSNET-7853. We will further look into the details of this problem and will keep you updated on the status of correction. We apologize for your inconvenience.

Best regards,

#20

Hi Awais,

thank you for your support. We tried the attached datasource file. The result is the same like with datasource file created by myself.
Screenshots from 2.jpg and 1a.jpg are still occuring. Fields are still missing like in 4.jpg.

So the WORDSNET-7122 is not yet solved. Our discision to buy another aspose.words licence was influenced by having a solution for this problem. We would be very happy if the problem would be solved in near future.

Cheers