MS Word Integration

This form provides settings for integration with Microsoft Word. Most of these settings apply to both importing comments from Word documents, and producing Word reports. This same form is available by clicking the Properties button on the Word Report form from within a project. Settings made from the Symphony Configuration form are global settings, whereas those made from a Word Report's properties form apply only to the Word template associated with that report.

Microsoft Word 2000 or later is required.

Symphony's integration with Word makes it possible to extract content from sources such as interview documents, and to produce reports that conform to your organization's style standards. Configuring Symphony to recognize your styles is as simple as telling Symphony what document contains your styles -- this can be your official template or any Word document that uses your styles -- and then telling Symphony which style to apply to each type of content.

For a detailed explanation about producing Word reports, please see Word Reports.

When you load a template file (.doc, or .dot), Symphony reads the styles contained in the document and loads them in the styles list. You then specify which style to apply to each content type by dragging and dropping from the styles list onto the corresponding content type.

Style Preferences

These fields define the Word styles associated with each content type. These settings are used for both importing content from Word documents, and producing Word reports from the content.

When importing comments from Word documents, Symphony looks for text in your document that uses these styles, ignoring everything else. This makes it possible to extract comments -- and optionally codes -- from interview documents that contain your interview questions, instructions to the interviewer, and other boiler plate. Where styles are found that correspond to Code Levels, symphony compares the text with existing codes in your project, and creates new ones when matches are not found. Comments are automatically coded to the last Code found in document. If no Codes are found, Comments are coded to the Unassigned. It is important to know that Symphony only looks at the style in use at the beginning of each paragraph, and the entire paragraph is processed or ignored on the basis of the style found.

When generating Word reports, Symphony uses these styles to format the output. This is specific to reports where the default output format of Coded Structure has been accepted.

The styles you specify must exist in the document you use as a template. If one does not, Symphony informs you of this when attempting to use the style, and the report generation is terminated.

There are two approaches for specifying which styles to use.

1. If you browse to a file or click the Refresh button with the name of a Word file (template or document) in the Word Template field, Symphony will read the styles from the document and populate the Available Styles list. You can then drag and drop the styles from the list onto the corresponding Style Preference.

2. Alternatively, if you already know the style names and you know they exist in your template, you can type the names directly into the corresponding Style Preference fields.

Word Template

This is the name and location of the Word document or template that Symphony will use as a model when creating a report.

Browse to Template

Click this button to locate the Word document or template you want use as a model for reports.

Force Numbering Restart

The Word document object model contains some complexities that at times makes it difficult to coax numbered lists to exhibit the desired behavior. A common problem is getting numbered lists to restart when switching between styles. To simply this, Symphony includes this switch, which liberates you from having to figure out how to get your Word template to restart numbering, short of editing the document settings directly.

Available Styles

This list is populated from the Word document or template you import using the Browse to Template button. Once styles are loaded, drag the preferred style onto the content item you would like to apply it to.

Refresh

Reloads the styles from the template file.