MailMergeSettings class

Specifies all of the mail merge information for a document. To learn more, visit the Mail Merge and Reporting documentation article.

Remarks

You can use this object to specify a mail merge data source for a document and this information (along with the available data fields) will appear in Microsoft Word when the user opens this document. Or you can use this object to query mail merge settings that the user has specified in Microsoft Word for this document.

You do not normally need to create objects of this class directly because Mail merge settings of a document are always available via the Document.mail_merge_settings property.

To detect whether this document is a mail merge main document, check the value of the MailMergeSettings.main_document_type property.

To remove mail merge settings and data source information from a document you can use the MailMergeSettings.clear() method. Aspose.Words will not write mail merge settings to a document if the MailMergeSettings.main_document_type property is set to MailMergeMainDocumentType.NOT_A_MERGE_DOCUMENT or the MailMergeSettings.data_type property is set to MailMergeDataType.NONE.

The best way to learn how to use the properties of this object is to create a document with a desired data source manually in Microsoft Word and then open that document using Aspose.Words and examine the properties of the Document.mail_merge_settings and MailMergeSettings.odso objects. This is a good approach to take if you want to learn how to programmatically configure a data source, for example.

Aspose.Words preserves mail merge information when loading, saving and converting documents between different formats, but does not use this information when performing its own mail merge using the MailMerge object.

Constructors

Name	Description
MailMergeSettings()	The default constructor.

Properties

Name	Description
active_record	Specifies the one-based index of the record from the data source which shall be displayed in Microsoft Word. The default value is 1.
address_field_name	Specifies the column within the data source that contains e-mail addresses. The default value is an empty string.
check_errors	Specifies the type of error reporting which shall be conducted by Microsoft Word when performing a mail merge. The default value is MailMergeCheckErrors.DEFAULT.
connect_string	Specifies the connection string used to connect to an external data source. The default value is an empty string.
data_source	Specifies the path to the mail-merge data source. The default value is an empty string.
data_type	Specifies the type of the mail-merge data source and the method of data access. The default value is MailMergeDataType.DEFAULT.
destination	Specifies how Microsoft Word will output the results of a mail merge. The default value is MailMergeDestination.DEFAULT.
do_not_supress_blank_lines	Specifies how an application performing the mail merge shall handle blank lines in the merged documents resulting from the mail merge. The default value is `False`.
header_source	Specifies the path to the mail-merge header source. The default value is an empty string.
link_to_query	Not sure about this one. The Microsoft Word Automation Reference suggests that this specifies that the query is executed every time the document is opened in Microsoft Word. But the OOXML specification suggests that this specifies that the query contains a reference to an external query file which contains the actual query. The default value is `False`.
mail_as_attachment	Specifies that the documents produced during a mail merge operation should be emailed as an attachment rather than the body of the actual e-mail. The default value is `False`.
mail_subject	Specifies the text which shall appear in the subject line of the e-mails or faxes produced during mail merge. The default value is an empty string.
main_document_type	Specifies the mail-merge main document type. The default value is MailMergeMainDocumentType.DEFAULT.
odso	Gets or sets the object that specifies the Office Data Source Object (ODSO) settings.
query	Contains the Structured Query Language string that shall be run against the specified external data source to return the set of records which shall be imported into the document when the mail merge operation is performed. The default value is an empty string.
view_merged_data	Specifies that Microsoft Word shall display the data from the specified external data source where merge fields have been inserted (e.g. preview merged data). The default value is `False`.

Methods

Name	Description
clear()	Clears the mail merge settings in such a way that when the document is saved, no mail merge settings will be saved and it will become a normal document.
clone()	Returns a deep clone of this object.

Examples

Shows how to execute a mail merge with data from an Office Data Source Object.

doc = aw.Document()
builder = aw.DocumentBuilder(doc)

builder.write("Dear ")
builder.insert_field("MERGEFIELD FirstName", "<FirstName>")
builder.write(" ")
builder.insert_field("MERGEFIELD LastName", "<LastName>")
builder.writeln(": ")
builder.insert_field("MERGEFIELD Message", "<Message>")

# Create a data source in the form of an ASCII file, with the "|" character
# acting as the delimiter that separates columns. The first line contains the three columns' names,
# and each subsequent line is a row with their respective values.
lines = [
    "FirstName|LastName|Message",
    "John|Doe|Hello! This message was created with Aspose Words mail merge."
    ]
data_src_filename = ARTIFACTS_DIR + "MailMerge.mail_merge_settings.data_source.txt"

with open(data_src_filename, "wt") as file:
    file.writelines(lines)

settings = doc.mail_merge_settings
settings.main_document_type = aw.settings.MailMergeMainDocumentType.MAILING_LABELS
settings.check_errors = aw.settings.MailMergeCheckErrors.SIMULATE
settings.data_type = aw.settings.MailMergeDataType.NATIVE
settings.data_source = data_src_filename
settings.query = "SELECT * FROM " + doc.mail_merge_settings.data_source
settings.link_to_query = True
settings.view_merged_data = True

self.assertEqual(aw.settings.MailMergeDestination.DEFAULT, settings.destination)
self.assertFalse(settings.do_not_supress_blank_lines)

odso = settings.odso
odso.data_source = data_src_filename
odso.data_source_type = aw.settings.OdsoDataSourceType.TEXT
odso.column_delimiter = '|'
odso.first_row_contains_column_names = True

#Assert.are_not_same(odso, odso.clone())
#Assert.are_not_same(settings, settings.clone())

# Opening this document in Microsoft Word will execute the mail merge before displaying the contents.
doc.save(ARTIFACTS_DIR + "MailMerge.mail_merge_settings.docx")

MailMergeSettings class