#  Other Applications & Softwares  > Word Formatting & General >  >  My Ultimate Frustration: Preventing Tables from Breaking Across Pages

## Jenn68

There is a lot of references available online on how to overcome this issue. I'm thinking that despite my efforts, I am either failing at understanding the solutions, or the solutions just aren't what I need. I am truly frustrated!

I have a mail merge document, that uses Excel data to create a directory style final document. The merged information is packaged up into a complex table, with each record in Excel occupying it's own table. The page has both a header and footer containing merged data as well. In the mail merge document, the table layout is followed by two carriage returns to provide the spacing between the tables on the destination document.

On average, I can get two tables (ie two records) on one 8.5x11 landscape oriented page. The third table, is always broken across onto the next page. It requires me to manually enter about 5 or 6 carriage returns to bump the table over to the next page as a whole.

For each row ... double checked by each cell ... of the table I have Table PropertiesRow 'Allow row to break across pages' UNchecked. I cannot see where, if any, rows exist in the table that would indicate allowing this option.

If I highlight the entire content, and choose Paragrapht to get to the paragraph property setting, Line & Page Breaks, and CHECK 'Keep lines together' and 'Keep with next' ... I still get the tables breaking across the page on my final document.

I've taken merged cells and split them into rows, and no go.

Please .... pleeeeease .... someone help me find a solution to this most annoying problem. I appreciate all attempts to render assistance.

Jenn

----------


## macropod

Hi jenn,

To what solutions do you refer? Have you studied my Microsoft Word Catalogue/Directory Mailmerge Tutorial, which you can download from:
http://lounge.windowssecrets.com/ind...owtopic=731107
or
http://www.gmayor.com/Zips/Catalogue%20Mailmerge.zip

The tutorial covers everything from list creation to the insertion & calculation of values in multi-record tables in letters. Do read the tutorial before trying to use the mailmerge document included with it.

For some recent, worked examples, see the attachment to the posts at:
http://www.msofficeforums.com/mail-m...html#post23345
http://www.msofficeforums.com/mail-m...html#post30327

Your comment "with each record in Excel occupying it's own table" suggests you actually have paragraph breaks between the table rows. The tutorial includes a 'Table Joiner' macro for cleaning up such 'artefacts'. FWIW, unchecking the 'Allow row to break across pages' option doesn't prevent a _table_ from breaking across pages, only its _rows_. To prevent a table from breaking across pages, you need to have the 'keep with next' paragraph attribute checked for every paragraph in, say, column A, except for the last paragraph. But, if you have the 'keep with next' paragraph attribute checked for every paragraph in your document, it's as good as not having it checked for any.

----------


## Jenn68

Hi Paul,

I appreciate the time your took to reply and create the tutorial. I'm finding this task to be over challenging for me, and was reluctant to try the Table Joiner macro out of fear of the results ... it may not be exactly what I was needing as a result of poor explanation on my part. Besides that, I wasn't sure how to use it.

I admit to not being a Word user, I'm more an Excel girl so some of the terms elude me. I have removed the "Keep with next" option in the paragraph setting that I originally applied to each cell (paragraph?) of the table. I reapplied it only to the "cells" I could along the far left of the table. There were two that did not have that option (Cells "GROOM" and "1"). Since you say that "Allow row to break across pages" has no effect on the table, I have chosen at this point to leave this property unchecked.

Still no love :-(

So we can all be on the same page (a pic is worth a 1000 words) Here is an image of my main merge document:

main_doc.jpg

and the result ...

directory_doc.jpg

Thanks you all in advance.

----------


## macropod

Hi jenn,

I had a look at your images, but they don't show ebough detail. If you could attach the actual documents to a post, it'd be far easier to diagnose.

For advice on how to install & use a macro, see: http://www.gmayor.com/installing_macro.htm. Hold off on that, though, for the moment as it's not even clear from your images what spacing there is between the tables.

----------


## Jenn68

Hi Paul, thanks for your continued support ... your right. I didn't realize the images were so poor.
I've attached the main document. I haven't sent data, but if you need it, I can send it along as well.

DT-WPE.doc

Hope this helps.

----------


## macropod

Hi Jenn,

I suspect the problem is caused by having the 'keep with next' attribute applied to the first empty paragraph after your tables.

BTW, any particular reason for having two tables in the body of the document? In Word 2007 & later, this is liable to result in the merged output having the lower table of a given pair shifted to the next page.

----------

