Link text fields in Designer 10 with cells in Excel or Word (table)?

Good Day Everyone,

I have been using Xara graphics since I got a copy of CorelXara back in '95. Have been doing a lot of personal things like binder covers, family announcements, etc. with it over the years and really enjoy the process.

This is a new area for me so please excuse me if I am not quite phrasing it correctly. My new boss recently asked if using my Xara Photo & Designer 10, if it was possible to build a background layer showing something like a parking lot layout. Then developing an overlay that would pull text data from an Excel file or Word document table to populate text data over the background?

An example I came up with was a parking lot showing the parking spaces with rows 1 through 10. Rows 1 - 4 have 25 spaces, 5 - 8 have 33 spaces and 9 & 10 have 30 spaces. So I draw the background spaces as Layer 1. In Layer 2 I would want to link each parking space to a cell in an external document. The need for the external document is that the text for each space may change from week to week but we would like t print out the most recent configuration. If these can be linked it would save a lot of time trying to do this manually in just the various layers.

Thank you for any help in this matter.


Mark M.

I don't think this is at all possible.

yeah, i don't think it's directly possible either but i have done something similar for intercom system directories. it did take a little while (more than i'd like to admit) to get the spacing for the excel text fields to line up with the xara image i made. after updating names in excel i export it as a pdf. then i import it into my image in xara. sometimes it groups a couple of the fields oddly but it always fits in the name and dial code slots perfectly. never cared why it groups some cells because it still works as needed. if there would be a need to adjust the text within the image after importing it, it's easy enough to cut the grouping apart into individual text.

may not be the best way but after getting it set up it works quickly. although...i'd like to hear if there's a cleaner way of doing this too for future reference :)

Is this the type of thing you're after:

nice Egg :D

and 5 minutes of formatting (cell height 20, width 6) an excel table was easily made for the names that is then exported as a pdf (using "selected fields only" option) and then imported into xara

Ingenious, but not at all what the OP originally wanted.

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Originally Posted by pauland

Ingenious, but not at all what the OP originally wanted.

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never said it was :p (i did agree with you a few posts up)
this is just a two step workaround that allows you to get the same results showing that at least it is possible. i'd rather have some way of doing something than no way at all

I'd rather have some way of doing something than no way at all

Absolutely. Just as well the parking lot is rectangular!

I'd question the value of an updateable parking space diagram. Who would use it?

I'd be more inclined to find on a list that my space was No. 84, rather than search a diagram to try and find where my name was. Finding space 84 is easier than finding a name.

So, perhaps a diagram with the numeric spaces and a table with the allocation?

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Ingenious, but not at all what the OP originally wanted.

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An example I came up with was a parking lot showing the parking spaces with rows 1 through 10. Rows 1 - 4 have 25 spaces, 5 - 8 have 33 spaces and 9 & 10 have 30 spaces. So I draw the background spaces as Layer 1. In Layer 2 I would want to link each parking space to a cell in an external document. The need for the external document is that the text for each space may change from week to week but we would like t print out the most recent configuration. If these can be linked it would save a lot of time trying to do this manually in just the various layers.

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It does exactly as it says on the tin Paul :)

The data is kept on a Google Drive spread sheet, up-datable every five minutes and printable.