Updating/refreshing Shapes Colours from Excel Spreadsheet

I have a spreadsheet with data i am using to populate a floor plan in Visio
2003 using the "Chair" as the Master.

I have linked a column of colour values to the shapes FillColour.
The shape is not showing the colour, however when i got to the Fill it is
saying the correct colour from the spreadsheet.

I.e. chair is white, data says 3 for green, go to fill it says green but
chair is still white

Do i need to refresh the shape some how? is there a step i am missing or is
this a bug that is fixed in 2007?

Hi Barb,

Thank you very much for your reply.

I figured it out eventually.... the "Chair" is made up of grouped shapes. I
was linking the Group fillforground field with my spreadsheet, but that was
not flowing down to the sub shapes. Hence the group would change colour (the
reason why i could see the colour change in fill) but not the sub shapes.

I have since created a new master and linked the sub shapes in to the groups
sheet properties.

Once again thanks for your response and looking forward to them releasing
2007 at work in a few weeks. (hope this explanation helps anyone else with
same or similar issue!

Matt

"Barb Way" wrote:

> If you close the drawing and re-open, do the colors display correctly (and
> match the values in the ShapeSheet)?
> If close/re-open doesn't change the display, then I don't think there is
> any method you could call in the API that would help.
>
> Could you share a few details about how you created the links, field names
> / types, etc? I'll try to set up a repro.
>
> In 2007 we have a new data linking wizard, and my quick testing there looks
> like this functions as expected. But changes to values in the ShapeSheet
> should fall through regardless of where the data came from originally.
>
> If you change the data value for the color cell by hand (editing the
> property linked to Fill color directly in the shapesheet), does the change
> propogate?
>
> Barb Way
> Product Support - Visio
> Microsoft Corporation
> [This posting is provided "As Is" with no warranties, and confers no
> rights.]
> --------------------
>
> I have a spreadsheet with data i am using to populate a floor plan in Visio
> 2003 using the "Chair" as the Master.
>
> I have linked a column of colour values to the shapes FillColour.
> The shape is not showing the colour, however when i got to the Fill it is
> saying the correct colour from the spreadsheet.
>
> I.e. chair is white, data says 3 for green, go to fill it says green but
> chair is still white
>
> Do i need to refresh the shape some how? is there a step i am missing or is
> this a bug that is fixed in 2007?
>