Merge a Spreadsheet in LabelForge
Video Transcription
The LabelForge labeling software allows you to create a wide variety of different labels and signs for your facility. One of its more advanced functions is automatically generating a batch of labels with data from a spreadsheet or database. This is called a merge because it merges information from a spreadsheet with a label design in LabelForge. It's a great way to create customized part labels, serial barcodes, or employee ID tags.
First, check that your spreadsheet is formatted correctly. Each label will use the information from a given row in the spreadsheet. That is, a label might show the information from cell 3A, cell 3B, cell 3C, and so on. We recommend using column headers to identify the information in each column. Without headers, LabelForge will simply identify each column as A, B, C, D, and so on.
Save your spreadsheet as an XLS, XLSX, or a CSV file, and we're ready to import it.
In LabelForge, click merge button at the bottom of the main menu. In the select table drop down menu, choose the file type that matches your spreadsheet from the listed options. Then click the connect to database button. A file browsing window will open. Locate your spreadsheet file, select it, and click open.
To make sure LabelForge is reading your spreadsheet correctly, you can click the view database table button.
Now you can build the label design. Close the merge menu to return to the main menu, and select the text option if you want to show information as text or choose the linear or two d bars options to show the data in the form of a barcode.
In the data source drop down menu, choose the column header or identifying letter for the column of information that you want to use for this design element. Click the add text or add barcode button and the first item from your selected column of the spreadsheet will appear on your label as a new text or barcode object.
Repeat this process for each data source in your spreadsheet, arranging them as needed on the label.
You can freely adjust the controls for existing text objects or barcodes, and you can change which column of information is used for a selected object with the data source dropdown menu.
Once you have all the data displayed as required, go back to the merge section and use the arrows at the bottom of the menu to cycle through the different rows of data. This will show you how each label in your batch will look.
If everything looks correct, click the print button in the toolbar. Choose print merge to print your complete batch of labels, or choose Print Current Label to only print the label shown on screen.
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