Text fields

PowerMerge works by replacing text fields contained in your presentation with records (cells) from an Excel worksheet.

Text fields are simply labels enclosed in brackets. Fields can contain letters and numbers but should start with a letter.

Example

A presentation contains the following field: [Company name]

The data sheet associated with the presentation is:

fields

PowerMerge will replace [Company name] with Exxon Mobil, Wal-Mart Stores, etc.

Field naming rules

The following chart shows examples of valid and invalid field names.

Field name example

Validity

Explanation

[a]

Valid

Starts with a letter.

[A]

Valid

Field is equivalent to [a] because field names are case insensitive.

[OdD CaSE]

Valid

Field names are case insensitive.

[Company Name]

Valid

Contains only letters and spaces.

[This is a long field]

Valid

It has less than 50 characters.

[I should totally start thinking about making my field names shorter]

Not valid

Field names are limited to 50 characters.

[Field number 1]

Valid

Numbers are allowed after the first character.

[1]

Not valid

Field names cannot start with a number; they must start with a letter.

[Mary had 1 little lamb]

Valid

Numbers are allowed after the first character.

[A "peculiar" field]

Not Valid

Fields can only contain letters and digits.

[A field with punctuation.]

Not Valid

Fields can only contain letters and digits.

CompanyName

Not valid

Not enclosed in brackets.

[ ]

Not valid

Field names must start with a letter.