Replacing content in Word 2010 Textboxes using OpenXML

Question

Using the Open XML SDK I've been successful in programatically finding bookmarks or text strings in a word document and inserting new content. I'm using OpenXmlPowerTools.SearchAndReplacer to do the text search and replace and this post's answer for the bookmarks Replace bookmark text in Word file using Open XML SDK

This all fails when the bookmark or the text I am trying to replace is located inside a Textbox.

Why does neither approach work within a Textbox? The Word documents I am trying to replace content within use Texboxes for layout and I can't work out what the problem is.

Does anybody have suggestions as to what might be the problem? Thanks

A Docx document is basicly a XML document. The approaches you mention probably search for the correct type of tag that has your text as a content. Textbox however might have a completely different tags that your code just ignores. I would check out the underlying XML for a document with a TextBox and see how it's kept in there. — Ingó Vals, Jun 23 '11 at 09:59

score 2 · Answer 1 · answered Jul 29 '11 at 14:23

I did this - it works on text boxes in the case where there are not multiple runs with text (like 1 word bolded

    Dim searchQuery = From tx In mainPart.Document.Body.Descendants(Of Text)()
        Where tx.Text.Contains(replaceData.OldText)

    Dim i As Integer
    For i = 0 To searchQuery.Count - 1
        searchQuery(i).Text = searchQuery(i).Text.Replace(replaceData.OldText, replaceData.NewText)
    Next

score 1 · Accepted Answer · answered Jun 23 '11 at 13:10

Here is the XML for a simple textbox with the word test in it:

<w:pict xmlns:w="http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/wordprocessingml/2006/main">
  <v:shapetype id="_x0000_t202" coordsize="21600,21600" o:spt="202" path="m,l,21600r21600,l21600,xe" xmlns:o="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" xmlns:v="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:vml">
    <v:stroke joinstyle="miter" />
    <v:path gradientshapeok="t" o:connecttype="rect" />
  </v:shapetype>
  <v:shape id="_x0000_s1027" style="position:absolute;margin-left:0;margin-top:0;width:186.35pt;height:110.6pt;z-index:251660288;mso-width-percent:400;mso-height-percent:200;mso-position-horizontal:center;mso-width-percent:400;mso-height-percent:200;mso-width-relative:margin;mso-height-relative:margin" type="#_x0000_t202" xmlns:v="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:vml">
    <v:textbox style="mso-fit-shape-to-text:t">
      <w:txbxContent>
        <w:p w:rsidR="00B558B5" w:rsidRDefault="00B558B5">
          <w:proofErr w:type="gramStart" />
          <w:r>
            <w:t>test</w:t>
          </w:r>
          <w:proofErr w:type="gramEnd" />
        </w:p>
      </w:txbxContent>
    </v:textbox>
  </v:shape>
</w:pict>

You can see the structure is different then when searching for text within a bookmark since a textbox is actually stored as a picture. If you adjust your searching algorithm to deal with this different structure then you should be able to find the text and replace it.

Replacing content in Word 2010 Textboxes using OpenXML

2 Answers2