Using text boxes and bookmarks to automatically copy text

[Peter Hansen]

I am a first time user of OO 3.1 Writer on Windows Vista. I got frustrated with not being able to use the report form I created in MS Office 2003 once I upgraded to 2007 and a friend suggested I download OO and that might work. It didn't, so he said to re-create the report on OO. I'm lost on how to translate my report from MS Ofice to OO. But here is what I want to do: Create boxes of text that I can type into (or dictate into using Dragon Naturally Speaking) so that the text is then automatically copied into another text box with the same name. For example, "Patient: John Doe" After typing or dictating in "John Doe" in the text box after Patient the text "John Doe" would automatically be copied into the text box in another area of the document labelled "Patient:" so I would not have to type it myself again. I would want to do the same with several other text boxes: Date, Date of Birth, Record Number, Unit, Reason for Referral, Diagnosis and Recommendation. In MS Office Word 2003 I had used text boxes with bookmarks in the original box and a cross-reference in the destination text box that automatically typed in the text that I had bookmarked. It worked beautifully. But it doesn't work in MS Office Word 2007. Could someone take me step by step through the process of creating such a document in OO 3.1 Writer? I sure would appreciate it!

[RoryOF]

I think the obvious answer is to find your old MS Office 2003 disks and reinstall, probably on either XP or Windows 2000. Then your report (template in OOo speak?) will work as you designed it. This is not to say that OOo cannot do the job (although I doubt it), but it is certain there will be a lot of difficulty in transferring the functionality of your task to OOo.

[Hagar Delest]

Some hints here: [Solved] User fields? Input fields? Hopelessly confused.

There are several topics about Dragon, you should run a search for that keyword.

Thanks to add '[Solved]' at beginning of your first post title (edit button) if your issue has been fixed.

[Peter Hansen]

I received two replies.

The first said to reinstall MS Office 2003 on XP and go back to how I did it before. That is a great idea, but, unfortunately that is not possible. My old laptop died, my new laptop came with Vista, not XP. And I don't have my old disks for MS Office 2003.

The second reply was from Hagar and referred me to another posting. That looks promising, but for a person new to this OO I need more help. I did try inserting a user field first in the place where I wanted the info to end up and then an input field in the beginning of the document where I first enter the information. But I probably did it wrong because it did not update the user field when I hit F9, it stayed blank. Hagar, could you please provide me with a more step by step guide? I don't know what is meant by many of the terms I see, e.g., Name and Reference and Value. And I do not know how to connect the two fields so that when I type in the client's name in the input field (by the way, is that the box that pops up, and if it is, where do I type in the client's name--in the narrow rectangular box at the top or the larger rectangular box below?) it gets automatically transferred to the user field later in the document where I want the client's name to go, or manually gets transferred when I hit F9. Thanks for any help. I really appreciate it!

[Hagar Delest]

See that example:

Form.odt

(7.32 KiB) Downloaded 674 times

NB: make sure that the variable format is set to Text when you create it. Just play with the feature and try to learn how it works. I've created the second field before the input field.

[Peter Hansen]

Hagar,

I downloaded the example you included and have been trying to recreate it, but so far no success: when I try it the second box does not automatically update, nor does it update if I hit F9. Plus, as I looked more closely at your example, I wondered how it could be an example of the technique working. The first box reads "type the name here" (all the same roman text) but the second box reads "type the name here" with the last two words in italics. The second box should be an exact replica of the first box if it were automatically updating. How did it get to have the last two words in italics? I don't mean to be an irritant, but I am still stymied. Do I need to somehow include the bookmark or cross-reference features I see on the side bar to get the first box to automatically update into the second box once I have typed in the text into the first box?

[Hagar Delest]

I don't understand. I don't see any italics on my version. I just typed in standard font (Liberation) without applying any formatting:

Capture.png (4.98 KiB) Viewed 10481 times

I just click the first field, enter the text in the large area (under the small one). And as soon as I hit the OK button, the second field updates automatically.

[Peter Hansen]

Hagar,

Well, I got it to work, just like you said, and went on to re-do my entire template. I was feeling so good about it all: finally an answer to all my problems with dictating my reports! But I should have heeded your initial advice to look up Dragon comments. I guess OOo is not compatible with Dragon Naturally Speaking. I read some of the discussions. And the most relevant seems to be as follows (which I have taken the liberty to copy and paste):

"Dragon" in http://www.oooforum.org/forum/search.phtml gives more thatn 30 results.
http://www.oooforum.org/forum/viewtopic ... ght=dragon

The issue is always the same: It is not OOo's obligation to support any tool that wants to dump it's output. It is always the obligation of the data generating program to pass over it's output to one program or the other. There are thousands of programs that can use installed MS Office software to generate reports in Word, Excel or something. They all support MS Office. Microsoft does not do anything to support those 3rd party programs. It works exactly the other way round.

This is not precisely correct. There is an excellent discussion on KnowBrainer.com forum at http://www.knowbrainer.com/PubForum/ind ... hread20192 that clarifies the support of SAPI (Speech API) in software. The fact is, OOo does not support SAPI and it should. If it did, then there would be far fewer issues with using DNS. A partial quote -- "Open Office is not Select-and-Say compliant/compatible.... One of the basic aspects of Select-and-Say involves SAPI 4 (Speech Application Program Interface). DNS does not communicate directly with applications. It does so through two SAPI DLLs, one for dictation and one for commands."

So, get OOo supporting SAPI and thereby Select-and-Say and those of us with typing issues would be a lot better off.

So, I guess I'm back to the drawing board unless someone can quickly "get OOo supporting SAPI and thereby Select-and-Say and those of us with typing issues would be a lot better off," as donbott wrote on Tue Nov 11, 2008 2:24 pm. That was over a year ago, so it doesn't look like the project has much priority. But it sure would be useful to those of us who want to dictate reports! Got any ideas how to get MS Office 2007 to use my old MS Office 2003 report format? So far, I have not heard back from their community forum. But you have been great at quickly responding. Say a prayer for me so I'll know where to turn to next.

[RoryOF]

I expand on my original posting: as you wish to use your application professionally, your priority is to get it working soonest.

You know it works on XP and MSOffice 2003. Therefore the quickest way is to regress to XP and MSO 2003. I accept that you have not got master disks; these may be obtained fairly readily, perhaps from ebay, and installed to your new laptop, or better yet, to your old laptop if it is still around. XP will install using a serial number; do not allow it advance beyond SP2, (Service Pack 2) as subsequent SPs "phone home" and can have difficulty with serial numbers. I have no information on install of MSO2003. It is sometimes useful to contact a small local computer fix-it company to sort out problems of this sort. Can MSO2003 run on Vista? Again, a small local company might be of help

So, get OOo supporting SAPI and thereby Select-and-Say and those of us with typing issues would be a lot better off

The fact is that it doesn't support SAPI at present. It is worth keeping an eye on the extensions repository at openoffice.org. There is at least one extension that reads text from OOo. If this sort of functionality can be added, then it is possible that some dictating technology might also be possible, when/if someone gets around to it.

[Hagar Delest]

I've redone the layout of your quotes to make it more clear and keep the hyperlinks.

You should vote for the enhancement request and add your comments: Issue 71542 - Compatibility with Nuance/Dragon Naturally Speaking.

Thanks to add '[Solved]' at beginning of your first post title (edit button) if your issue has been fixed (since the bookmarks issue is fine now).