There are lots of different ways, but the exact details depend on which
version of Word you are using. Broadly speaking, you can either:
a. use the facilities provided in the Mail Merge Helper in Word 97 or
2000 - click the Get Data button, and use the Create Data Source option.
When Word prompts you to save the data, you can choose a number of formats,
e.g. text file, Word document and so on.
b. use the facilities provided by the Mail Merge Wizard in Word 2002 or
2003. In the case, Word creates a special kind of Jet (Access) database
(.mdb) called an Office Address List.

If you want to create a data source outside Word, lots of different formats
can be used, e.g.
a. comma-delimited text files with a header row containing column names
b. an Excel spreadsheet with one row per record and a header row containing
column names
c. Access tables and Queries (with some exceptions)
d. A Word document containing a table with one row per record and a header
row containing column names
e. tables in databases such as SQL Server or Oracle that can be accessed by
ODBC (or OLEDB, in Word 2002/2003)

Each format has its advantages and disadvantages, e.g. you may have
difficulty if you use (a) and your data contains commas, double-quote
characetrs and so on. If you are familiar with Access, it is worth
considering keeping your data in there, and you may find that its report
function is better for creating the output you need. For small data sources
with fewer than 64 columns I still favour using (d) because you can create
everything you need in Word, and it's easy to create multi-line fields and
use things such as double quotes. However, merging from Word data sources
can be very slow in Word 2002/2003.

Peter Jamieson
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