database to edit multiple sections of different documents

M

mithu

Hello everyone,

Post is kinda long but I really need some help on this one. Any input
that can be provided would be great.

here is what is going on. For my job i have to edit multiple
statements of work. these are documents that have different sections
describing the work i will do for a client. Usually when i change one
section in a document i have to open up 10 other documents and copy
and paste the same verbiage into a section within those documents.
this process is getting very time consuming.

I had a great idea the other day and started to create a access
database that essentially has each individual sections in a document
as a record in a table. The table also has document ID which lets me
know which document i am editing and a section ID which indicates
which section within the document, and a memo field that allows rich
text this holds the verbiage for that section. I am using access
2007.

My plan was to have the section ID's be sequential so that i can run a
report which essentially would have my whole document in the right
order. I would take the report aznd export it to word giving me my
document needed.

to edit the sections i am thinking i will create a form that has 2
combo boxes one for documents and the other for the section. then an
add button. when the add button is clicked it takes the docuemnt ID
and section id from the 2 combo boxes and adds it to a list box. this
way i can keep track of all the documents i want to edit. I was going
to have 1 rich text boxes called txt_update that stores the new text
that i want to add or replace and one label lbl_current that shows me
the current text in that within that specific section. I am using a
list box to display the document and sections i have added so that
when i click on that specific entry lbl_current displays what is
currently in that record.

After i have added all the document id's and sections that need to be
updated into the list box. I was going to write vba code that
replaced those records listed in the list box with the new virbage
from txt_update.

Then i was going to have a button create reports which output the
sections for each document in sequential order. thus creating my
document and then i would export that to word. and have my updated
documents.

I am finding this a lot hard that i previsouly thought.. for one thing
when i export to word i lose my my formatting, and also I am finding
that when I add the sections in the documents into the memo filed not
all my formatting is comming through.

Can someone please give me advise on this. If you know of a program
that does something similar to what i am asking or know of a better
way for me to go about this please do let me know. Or if anyone can
sugguest any different approaches i should take I would be very
thankful.
 
W

Wayne-I-M

HI

Of course you could get this to work in access, (just my opinion) this is
not really the "type" of wrok that access is best at. MSword has the
Autotext facility which I think may be a better solution. Have a look at the
codeing available in word. Note that if you just copy the Autotext section
of a .doc you will not copy the code (word is a bit strange like that) so you
may want to check out the template programming. But in this case I think
that your workflow will be improved by looking at word.

If you already understood access then it would be a simple thing to get your
project up and running in access but.... as a new project on an unfamilier
programme you may be best to look at the programme that was specifically
designed to do just what you want.

Good luck with your project
 

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