Linking Visio and Excel and showing shape labels

Started by dbrowng1, April 23, 2008, 09:52:10 AM

Previous topic - Next topic

0 Members and 6 Guests are viewing this topic.

dbrowng1

Would appreciate any help!

I am working on a network audit.  I want to document the physical ports in an Excel spreadsheet and connect them to a Visio diagram via ODBC.  I am using Visio 2002.  I have been successful so far in creating the link between files.  And I am happily able to make a change in the spreadsheet on a certain field and see the change instantaneously in my Visio file customer property.   

But one problem remains.  I want to show that field as a label for the shape.  But I don't know how.

Let me try to explain further.  To make it simple, let's say we have 8 ports, with shapes represented below represented below with the word "shape".

shape1

shape2

shape3

shape4

shape5

shape6

shape7

shape8

Each shape will generate a customer field identifying it, a name of sorts.   For example:

shape1
     Portname:  port 1

shape2
     Portname:  port 2
.... and so on.

But at present I have to right-click and find the custom field.  It's not evident by just opening the diagram.   What I want to see is:

shape1 ----   port 1

shape2 ----   port 2
...etc.

With this set up, I want to be able to go to my Excel spreadsheet and replace the data "port 1" with "This is port 1.", and then see the following:

shape1 ---- This is port 1.

Sorry for the verbose explanation, but I'm hoping for a nice, sweet solution that's just as clear.  I'm trying to code this with the ShapeSheet and I'm losing time at the client site.  I suppose it has something to do with the Action section, but I can't find any documentation to step me through it.  Anywhere idea?

Many thanks in advance!
David

Lars-Erik

First off, I would appreciate some information on how you got the link between excel and visio, i want to do the same thing but cant seem to get it to work the way i want.

As i understand, you linked your Excel sheet to Visio, and changes made to Excel are made in the custom properties of the shapes.
All you want now is to show the custom property field in the drawing itself?

Using the insert menu, goto field and select shapedata from the window that opened... select the shapedata, and select the field that contains your "port 1" data.
Next go to the shape's shapesheet and look for the section called "Textfields". Edit te format to "=FIELDPICTURE(37)" this will make your text movable but will keep it linked to your shape ( moving the sheep 1 inch to the left will move the text one inch to the left )

If i misunderstood your question... ignore this ;) but i would still like to know how you linked the two programs.

dbrowng1

Lars,

Thank you very, very much!  You really saved the day for me, and lots of time!  I have a meeting in five minutes but will come back shortly and reciprocate with a step-by-step explanation of the link.

later,
david

dbrowng1

Ok Lars,

Probably the easiest and best thing to do is to send you this link:

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/254591

This is how I worked out the link between my Visio and Excel files.  Let me know if you have any questions, but this is where I got all my info.  Still experimenting.

Good luck!
David

Lars-Erik

A yes the database wizard, I was secretly hoping you used an other method. The template I'm making need a link between Excel and Visio, but the other direction (Visio to Excel). I cant seem to find a way to get this to work.

Glad I could help though.

- Lars-Erik

Donaldo

Hi Lars-Erik

I am currently trying to develop a link that goes from my Visio template to an Excel register.

Did you end up achieving this in a way you were happy with?

Do you have any tips you could share?

Donaldo

Browser ID: smf (possibly_robot)
Templates: 4: index (default), Display (default), GenericControls (default), GenericControls (default).
Sub templates: 6: init, html_above, body_above, main, body_below, html_below.
Language files: 4: index+Modifications.english (default), Post.english (default), Editor.english (default), Drafts.english (default).
Style sheets: 4: index.css, attachments.css, jquery.sceditor.css, responsive.css.
Hooks called: 225 (show)
Files included: 35 - 1407KB. (show)
Memory used: 1107KB.
Tokens: post-login.
Cache hits: 14: 0.00288s for 26,544 bytes (show)
Cache misses: 4: (show)
Queries used: 17.

[Show Queries]