:
> On 04/04/2012 02:25 AM, "Jörg Kühne" wrote:
>> Dear List
>>
>> Is it possible to write (with Lyx) a circular letter with an
>> arbitrary letter pattern?
I have written perl programs which allow mail merge in insurance
companies for things such as renewal notices, price quotation, etc.
The main idea is that the user creates a normal LyX letter template
(using the article class - we found the letter classes were not suited
to NZ conventions). Where details particular to a client were to be
inserted, you put perl expressions e.g. ${title} ${firstname}
${lastname} etc.
A database program runs an SQL query and, for each row returned, builds
list of perl assignments
e.g.
${firstname}="John";
${lastname}="Smith";
...
and writes these to a file with a .rec suffix
Then the lyxmerge program loops through the .rec file, effectively
assigning the database values for each client then reads the template
and writes to an output file. Works beautifully giving the usual superb
typesetting.
Perl is most suitable for this because of its weird notion of using
distinctive syntax for variables. More pleasant languages like Python
do not.
When I wrote this many years ago, I also took the trouble to create
scripts to insert tables of data into the template. This involved using
some supplied perl library scripts which came with LyX.
The LyX developers now use python for this sort of thing and I haven't
kept my scripts up to date with current LyX versions.
If you want more detail, I'll happily pass on the scripts to those who
want them.
John O'Gorman
