SharePoint Data Doc – The New Way to Access your SharePoint list data from MS Word

When pulling content together for our weekly “SharePoint Community Newsletter” I find out about a lot of cool tools. During last weeks, I came across a really cool utility called SharePoint Data Doc. Here’s the low-down on what it is :

SharePoint Data Doc (SPDD) is the world’s first application level Add-In for MS Word that allows you to access your SharePoint list data directly from within your Word documents. If you currently create documents using your SharePoint data, then this application will save you a tonne of time, plain and simple.

The application is a breeze to use, simply select an area of your active document, and click to add a SPDD bookmark for the SharePoint list field of your choice. Then, by saving your document with the SPDD bookmark, it automatically becomes an SPDD template for creating batches of documents.

To easily integrate SPDD with your current set of standard office documents, simply repeat the process, selecting areas where you want to add SharePoint list data and adding SPDD bookmarks where required. Then save the documents when you are finished and your job is done.

In order to retrieve the data for these documents from SharePoint, the query builder within the application constructs CAML queries and executes them against the correct list using WSS, returning the data to your documents in double quick time. No messing about with logins, or waiting for your browser to load, just SharePoint data at maximum speed.

Additionally, to make administration of multiple users less of a chore, the security details and the datasets you create can then be easily rolled out to other users in a single XML file, allowing users to concentrate solely on document creation.

I also asked Declan Colman, why he built it …
“The application came about because of a business need to create batches of standard letters from a template, using SharePoint contact and custom list data as the source. Initially we had thought to use MS Word mail merge, but on investigation it became apparent that mail merge did not support attaching directly to SharePoint lists.“

He also goes on to say “In the end we had no choice but to implement a proprietary solution in Javascript to achieve the results we required. The question remained though, why was there no generic way to merge SharePoint list data to MS Word? So we set out to create just that.“

Want to find out more?

Versions Available: SharePoint 2007, SharePoint 2010, **New: SharePoint Online (Office 365)
available at:  www.DCSoftwareSolutions.com/Default.aspx

Note: There are separate downloads depending on whether you have MS Word 2007 or 2010.