Have a safe trip home (I arrived back in Boston a couple of hours ago).

Scott

I had a feeling that there was a smarter way to do this, but I was packing for Seattle while writing these three articles…

But it seems to me that applying the data graphics before the auto linking will cause a problem, because the shapes don’t have all of the fields yet. The auto-linking actually adds the fields, so that they can then accept the data graphic properly. I’ll have to re-check this.

Thanks for the tips, and anybody who submits code automatically gets an extra FIVE POINTS!

Two suggestions:

1) As long as you have to select all shapes and then apply the correct data graphic after doing the data linking — why not do it first and eliminate the application of the wrong one? To do so: a) Select All, b) apply the data graphic (nothing interesting will happen yet because the shapes don’t have data, but hang on for a moment), c) do the autolinking. The result: the data graphics will appear as soon as data linking is finished.

2) Even better, add two lines of code to your VBA routine to preselect the data graphic:
ActiveWindow.SelectAll
ActiveWindow.Selection.DataGraphic = _
ActiveDocument.Masters(“TrilogyDataGraphic”)
Then everything will be right when you do the autolinking. (NOTE: replace “TrilogyDataGraphic” with the actual name of your data graphic master.)

Of course, with another 6-8 lines of code you can even do the data linking automatically… maybe that should be the long anticipated fourth part of the trilogy!?!?