XMPIE (4.04 Macintosh)/InDesign CS4 issue

[Seb400]

I'm a designer who has 'inherited' a string of jobs set up with XMPIE.
I've been able to fathom out most of what I need, but in one instance I've just reached a personal brick wall!
I have a database (.csv) containing a Car club membership information.
A number of the members own one or more 'examples' of the make of car.

The database is arranged by membership number and contains duplicate information for each car owned, as below.

019 Member01 Address01 CarModel01
019 Member01 Address01 CarModel02
019 Member01 Address01 CarModel03

I have created a dynamic table which lists each car owned (referenced by membership number).
The problem I have when I produce a dynamic print pdf, is that in the case of Member01 above I get x3 identical copies of the same form.

Is there a way to set it up to produce a single sheet for Member01, rather than one for each data row.

MTIA
Steve

[BJMRGTIVR6]

trying to understand this (i too work on XMPie and you really need to think first to get stuff going correctly)

If member #19 has three cars, that person only needs one form? And in the file setup, they are shown to get three forms?

racking my brian on this a bit i suppose there is no way to say if member has Model #1 do this otherwise do nothing? or perhaps is there a way to create a Blank page for Model#2, 3, etc. then suppress the blank pages on variable print?

[Seb400]

Hi BJMRGTIVR6
It's a two page form. On the front are usual membership details (picked from database). On the back are terms and conditions, together with a list of the members own cars (currently in a dynamic table) that shows each of the cars owned by every member.

However, due to the way the database is constructed (having a separate row entry for each 'car' listed, with each of these rows containing duplicate information for each field, each one prints as a separate entry, dependent on the number of cars owned - hence the (3 cars) x3 copies in my dummy example.

As you suggest, given the nature of this software, there must be a way to list the name and address once only, together with a list of each car associated with each member. This is the help I'm looking for.

An alternative 'ignorant, long-winded' solution would be to remove the separate/often duplicate info rows and put back only the relevant 'car' information into new columns for each member listing eg: car01 engine no.01 chassis no.01 colour01 car02 engine no.02 chassis no.02 colour02 car03 engine no.03 chassis no.03 colour03. I think that this could then be run as a pure data merge file.

Steve
SPG(TVRV8S)

[BJMRGTIVR6]

is the whole line you show above in one column or is it broken into separate columns as spaced?

The problem as I AM NOW SEEING IT (sorry for caps) is that there should have been columns for car#1 | Car #2 | Car#3 | etc. then you could have just said to place each car below, next to, otherwise, leave blank.

The way I now understnd this, it appears that CarModel02 could be someone's CarModel01, therefore you cannot easily say, "if carmodel 02 = Chevy Mustang, then remove Name/Address part.

sorry, cannot think of any other help now.

[Seb400]

Hi BJMRGTIVR6
Most info is in separate columns, there are currently x23 columns:

Member no Name Address Car Chassis Engine No
019 Member01 Address01 CarModel01 xxxxx xxxxxxx
019 Member01 Address01 CarModel02 xxxxxxx xxxxxx
019 Member01 Address01 CarModel03 xxxxxx xxxxx
020 Member02 Address02 CarModel03 xxxxxxx xxxxx
021 Member03 Address03 CarModel01 xxxxxxx xxxxx
021 Member03 Address03 CarModel04 xxxxxx xxxxx
022 Member04 Address04 CarModel02 xxxxxx xxxx

The Name and Address are unique, so could you say that this combination should only appear in one instance in the address panel, then move onto the next Name and Address? But list each of the cars (ref by Member no) in the dynamic table on the back?

Like you say, for my purposes it would have been more convenient to have had only one 'row' for each member - containing all the information, rather than a separate row for each of the cars! I'll have a word with the database manager today to see how easily the info can be arranged to suit my capabilities!

Thanks for your advice/help
Steve