mass merge bilinugal invitations with latex or xetex

After some hours of typesetting and programming this I feel that I should share it with you. One old version is here, german: Serieneinladung.

Goal was:

• address singles, couples
• have a landspace page with different languages left and right
• sort some addressing out, e.g. the german "Euch" und "Dich"
• have two different global groups for different invitations
• have this all done by reading in a CSV file

The csv file looked like this (2nd field is the group, 3rd the addressing):

 english names;a;Euch
 english name;b;Dich
 german name;c;Dich
 german names;d;Euch

• Group a are more than one, resulting in "Euch" as the formal addressing; also the english text is on the right, german left;
  and is invited full.
• Group b is also english, but just one person: "Dich";
  and invited just for the party.
• Group c is a german single with the addressing "Dich";
  and the german invitation text on the right, english on the left;
  and invited full.
• Group d is e.g. a german family, addressed with "Euch";
  and invited just to the party.

And here the code, just play around with it.
It will create a pdf with as many pages as lines in the csv file.

 \documentclass[12pt,a4]{scrartcl}   
 \pagestyle{empty}  
 \usepackage[landscape]{geometry}  
 \geometry{a4paper,left=30mm,right=30mm, top=1.5cm, bottom=1.5cm}  
 \usepackage{fontspec}  
 \usepackage{xunicode}  
 \usepackage{xltxtra}  
 %\setmainfont[Mapping=tex-text]{TeX Gyre Chorus}  
 \setmainfont[Mapping=tex-text]{URW Chancery L}  
  \usepackage{ifthen}  
  \newcommand{\inviteA}[1]{ % english/townhall  
                      \begin{minipage}{0.5\textwidth}  
                  \begin{center}  
                  \fontsize{18pt}{18pt}\selectfont  
                  Wir möchten \Dich\\  
                  #1\\  
                  recht herzlich ...  
                  \end{center}  
                  \end{minipage}  
                      \begin{minipage}{0.5\textwidth}  
                     \begin{center}  
                     \fontsize{18pt}{18pt}\selectfont  
                     We request the pleasure of\\  
                     #1\\  
                  Townhall at ...
                     \end{center}  
                  \end{minipage}  
  }  
  \newcommand{\inviteB}[1]{ % english/church  
                      \begin{minipage}{0.5\textwidth}  
                      \begin{center}  
                      \fontsize{18pt}{18pt}\selectfont  
                      Wir möchten \Dich\\  
                      #1\\  
                   recht herzlich ...
                      \end{center}  
                   \end{minipage}  
                      \begin{minipage}{0.5\textwidth}  
                     \begin{center}  
                     \fontsize{18pt}{18pt}\selectfont  
                   We request the pleasure of\\  
                   #1\\  
                   Church at ...
                     \end{center}  
                   \end{minipage}  
  }  
   \newcommand{\inviteC}[1]{ % german/townhall  
                       \begin{minipage}{0.5\textwidth}  
                       \begin{center}  
                       \fontsize{18pt}{18pt}\selectfont  
                       We request the pleasure of\\  
                       #1\\  
                       Townhall at ...  
                       \end{center}                    
                   \end{minipage}  
                       \begin{minipage}{0.5\textwidth}\begin{center}  
                       \fontsize{18pt}{18pt}\selectfont  
                       Wir möchten \Dich\\  
                       #1\\  
                       recht herzlich ... 
                       \end{center}  
                   \end{minipage}  
   }  
   \newcommand{\inviteD}[1]{ % german/church  
                       \begin{minipage}{0.5\textwidth}  
                       \begin{center}  
                       \fontsize{18pt}{18pt}\selectfont  
                       We request the pleasure of\\  
                       #1\\  
                       Townhall at ...
                       \end{center}  
                    \end{minipage}  
                  \begin{minipage}{0.5\textwidth}  
                  \begin{center}  
                  \fontsize{18pt}{18pt}\selectfont  
                  Wir möchten \Dich\\  
                  #1\\  
                     recht herzlich ...  
                  \end{center}  
                    \end{minipage}  
   }  
  \newif\ifmore \moretrue  
  \def\chopline#1;#2;#3;#4 \\{  
  \def\names{#1}  
  \def\langplace{#2}  
  \def\Dich{#3}  
  \def\count{#4}  
  }  
  \begin{document}  
  \newread\quelle  
  \openin\quelle=GuestList.csv  
  \loop  
  \read\quelle to \zeile  
  \ifeof\quelle  
   \global\morefalse  
  \else  
   \expandafter\chopline\zeile\\  
   \ifthenelse{\equal{\langplace}{a}}  
                  {  
                  \inviteA{\names}  
                  \pagebreak  
                  }{}  
   \ifthenelse{\equal{\langplace}{b}}  
                   {  
                   \inviteB{\names}  
                   \pagebreak  
                   }{}  
   \ifthenelse{\equal{\langplace}{c}}  
                   {  
                   \inviteC{\names}  
                   \pagebreak  
                   }{}  
   \ifthenelse{\equal{\langplace}{d}}  
                   {  
                   \inviteD{\names}  
                   \pagebreak  
                   }{}  
  \fi  
 \ifmore\repeat  
 \closein\quelle  
  \end{document}  

The csv file was done in LibreOffice and with the sumif() function we calculated the headcount, having a number in each line for each party.

Hope I could help.