This article provides instructions on how to set up the fields in your form templates. These fields will appear in the form for the recipient to be filled in with their information.
When creating a new form template, in the section Form Template Fields, you can select which fields you want to appear in the form for the recipient based on the information you want to collect from them.
In the section Form Template Fields, you will see two fields that have to be always present in a form: Recipient Name and Recipient Email.
Still, you can add more fields by clicking the button Add form field.
- Mandatory fields: Recipient name and Recipient email
- Add form fields
- Insert the template fields in your PDF
Mandatory fields: Recipient name and Recipient email
The fields called Recipient Name and Recipient Email are added automatically to every form template and cannot be removed as they are mandatory for the form to work.
Also, they cannot be renamed: they must be named RECIPIENT_NAME and RECIPIENT_EMAIL. The Name of the field is how the Penneo system will identify the information typed in the field after it's been filled in by a recipient.
What can be changed about these two mandatory fields is the Label. The Labels will be shown in the form on the corresponding fields to indicate the information that must be typed in. The Labels can be edited to make it clearer to the recipient what information they need to type in the field.
Note: If you are editing an older webform, chances are it is missing one of the now mandatory fields. If so, you need to add them and name them as above for you to be able to save your changes.
These fields are mandatory when creating a new template form because the recipient will receive a copy of the form after filling it out. Penneo will automatically send an email with the filled-in form to the email address typed in the form in the Recipient email field.
Add form fields
Besides those two mandatory fields, you can add more fields to your template form by clicking the button Add form field.
Every form field needs to have a name, a label, a type, and you also need to decide whether the fields are required or optional.
Description of the form fields details
- Name: The Name of the field is how the Penneo system will identify the information typed in the field after it's been filled in by a recipient. Thus, there cannot be two fields with the same name. For example, if you create two form fields to collect phone numbers, you cannot name them both phone_number - you will have to choose a unique name for each one of them to enable Penneo to identify and distinguish the information typed in the field; so you will have to name them, for example, personal_phone_number and work_phone_number.
- Label: The Label is what the person/recipient will see when filling out the form, so it should clearly indicate what needs to be typed in that field. What you type in the Label field will be shown in the form on the corresponding field to indicate which information must be typed in it; for example, if you add a field to collect the address of the person/recipient, the Label of the field could be "Please write your full address as street, number, zip, and city".
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Type: The Type refers to the specific kind of information that needs to be inserted in the field and the rules that need to be met for the information to be validly filled in. Here's is an overview of the Types available:
- Text: If you select the Text Type, the person filling in the field will have to insert a simple one-line text. No specific rules need to be met.
- Multiline Text: If you choose this Type, the person filling in the field will be able to insert several lines of text. Therefore, this type is usually used for a blank area to be filled in with a longer text/description.
- Multiple Selection: This Type lets you create a drop-down menu with more options to choose among. A simple example could be a drop-down menu where the person can select Yes or No.
- Email: If you select this Type for the field, the person filling it in will have to type in a valid email address, such as name@domain.com, for the value to be accepted and recognized by the system.
- Date: If you select this Type for the field, a calendar will be shown in the form where the person will have to select a date set as dd/mm/yyyy.
- Social Security Number: If you select this Type for the field, the person filling it in will have to type in a valid Social Security Number for the value to be accepted and recognized by the system. Only numbers can be typed in the field; alphabetical characters will not be allowed. At the moment, the SSN typed in can include 10, 11, or 12 digits to accommodate Danish, Swedish, and Norwegian SSNs.
- VATIN: This field type can only be used if your recipient is a Danish company. The person filling it in will have to type in a valid Danish organization number (no longer than 8 digits).
- Finally, when setting up a new form field, you will see two options next to it - called Required and User Editable:
- If you check-mark the box next to the User Editable option, the new field will be available and visible in the form. If you don't checkmark it, you will not see it among the available fields when you move to the next step of Inserting the fields in your PDF.
- If you check-mark the box next to the Required option, the new field will be a mandatory field that the person filling in the form will have to fill out for the form to be valid.
Note: The font used for the input fields is Helvetica, 10pt.
Order of the fields in the template form creation
The fields’ order must correspond to the order of the fields in the PDF so that they are not disarranged in the final output.
You can change the order of the fields by clicking on the six squares next to the field you want to move and dragging and dropping it in the desired position.
Insert the template fields in your PDF
Once you're done adding the form fields, you can add more advanced options (that can be found and enabled under Show Advanced options - read more about them here).
After checking that everything looks correctly set up in this first phase of the form template settings, you can click Save and continue to proceed to the next step of building your form template. You will now see the PDF you chose as the body of your form template.
You can now insert the template fields in your PDF as set up in the previous step.
Place the fields in the PDF by dragging and dropping them in the right spots so that they match the content of the document.
To help you place the fields more precisely and in the correct order, you can also activate Show grid lines and Show field order by check-marking the boxes next to those options in the top-right menu.
After placing all the fields and setting their size, click on Done to save the changes and to be able to publish the form template.
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