[Solved] Mailmerge creates blank sheets

[blackdogsdad]

I'm trying to produce a mailshot and am just about there BUT at the final crucial stage, when the "Mailmerged"
file is created with all the actual letters in, there's a blank page inserted between each of the proper pages.
These blanks don't show up on the preview, but they're there on the page numbering and they "print" too.

I searched these forums and found reports of the same problem, albeit when printing envelopes.

Incidentally I've been creating the file using the "Form Letter" procedure rather than the Mailmerge Wizard
as the latter seemed to want to increase the addressee line-fields and I couldn't work out how to change that.

Also: does anyone know if OpenOffice has changed the way it works with Mailmerge?
I previously used MS Office for my mailshot, so when I bought a new PC and installed OpenOffice (8 months ago), I checked
to see what would happen with my old MS Office Mailmerge file and was pleased to see it looked like a seamless transition
- it just picked up everything.
However, now I come to use it for real I've had to recreate the Mailmerge fields etc: has something recently changed?

Any help gratefully accepted!

[thomasjk]

Under Tools-->Options--->Writer-->Print uncheck "Automatically Inserted blank pages".

[blackdogsdad]

Thanks Tom... I've just logged back on to say I'd just found that solution which is a definite help
BUT... why does AOO think those blank pages would ever be wanted?
AND... when printing, you still have to allow for them: for example, if I want to print actual typed letters 1-4, I have to tell it to print 1-7.

That might seem a minor inconvenience but as I'm about to print approx. 2,500 letters - and I tend to do them in batches of 50
so's the occasional paper / ink running out doesn't become disastrous - it's going to become unnecessarily complicated!

[Mr.Dandy]

Remember that every odd-numbered page is a right-hand page, and every even-numbered page is a left-hand page.
The classic problem is that a mailmerge process try to constantly repeating page 1.
So insert a blank left-hand page is to preserve the alternating left+right pages.

[thomasjk]

And for the future perform your test prints to a file. No wasted paper and you can review the file for accuracy before actually printing anything.

[HowardJ]

I've just met this problem printing my Christmas envelopes. It's worth noting that this isn't a permanent change unless you save the file you are printing from after making it. And then it only applies to that particular file as with other printer options.