Adding fields (Office 2003)

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I haven’t worked much with Word besides the basic text editing, so now I’m faced with a task that I’m not sure how to work with. Let’s say I have a contract that I will make it as ‘generic’, whereby whenever the client’s name should appear, it needs to be entered in the word document as ‘enter client’s name here’ or something similar. Then the person who will actually update the contract to a particular client, will change that field to the actual client’s name.
I could go through the whole document and enter the words ‘enter client’s name here’ manually and make it bold and italic and the person will simply replace these words with the client’s name, but I’ve seen somewhere a while ago something that they called ‘fields’, whereby when it showed the text (ex. client’) and when you clicked on it, the text disappeared and it allowed you to enter the name of the client. Also this was done automatically (once you entered in one place, it changed it throughout the whole document automatically.
Could someone please explain to me (step by step) how to create such a field if possible, I’d really appreciate it!

Thanks,
kislany

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One way to do this is using form fields in a document protected for forms.

• Display the Forms toolbar (View | Toolbar | Forms).
• Position the insertion point where you want the user to enter some information.
• Type a descriptive test, then click the Text Form Field button on the Forms toolbar.
• Double click the new form field.
• Enter a bookmark name for the field (without spaces).
• Tick the check box ‘Calculate on exit’.
• Click OK.
• Position the insertion point where you want to refer to the information.
• Press Ctrl+F9 to insert field braces { }.
• Type the bookmark name between the braces.
• Press F9 to hide the field codes and update the field – it will disappear for the moment.
• Repeat for other information you want the user to enter.
• Click the Protect Form button on the Forms toolbar.
• You can now enter information in the Text Form Field(s). As soon as you tab out of a form field, the references to the form field will be updated.
• You won’t be able to edit the rest of the text. If you wish, you can divide your document into protected and unprotected sections.
• Unprotect the document before modifying it further.
• To add a section, select Insert | Break, click Continuous, then click OK.
• To specify which sections are protected:
  • Select Tools | Protect Document…
  • Tick ‘Allow only this type of editing in the document’.
  • Select ‘Filling in forms’ from the dropdown.
  • Click ‘Select sections…’
  • Clear the check box for sections you want to be unprotected, then click OK.
  • Click ‘Yes, Start Enforcing Protection’.
  • You can provide a password if you wish. Leave blank if you don’t want to set a password.
    [/list]
  • You can only edit form fields in the protected section(s), and enter text freely in the unprotected section(s).
    [/list]See screenshot. I’ll attach a sample document in my next reply.

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Sample document attached.

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If Hans solution isn’t attractive, you could consider buying Bill Coan’s Word add-in Simpleprompter (no I’m not on commission, I just find it a great add-in). The learning curve (important for me) is very easy. It works for Mac & Windows. This is no good if you are distributing the documents for others who do not have the simpleprompter add-in installed.

1. Install the add-in
2. Enter your prompts as plain text. e.g. this is the text you enter to ask for a text input. [stUser PromptDefault Value]
3. Run the Simpleprompter
4. Complete the prompts.

You are only prompted once for any identical prompts e.g. client name.

You are also able to edit the entire document, undo your prompts & have complex prompts without too much trouble.

We use Simplepprompter after a mail merge from our client database program.

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I’d use custom fields and a macro to update them.

If you add [a] custom field to the template document (“Client name”, “client address”) you can then use a macro – perhaps an autonew macro, or one run from a button – to prompt the user for the information, and then to update the document.

You can add custom fields from the File|Information – oops, showing my age here (it was that several versions ago) – I mean File|PropertIes, and click on the “Custom” tab.

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Thanks for your replies and quick help. I will go through each and see which is mostly suitable for what I need. I need to test a few case scenarios first.

Cheers,
kislany

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I sometimes use Custom Document Properties, and { DOCPROPERTY } fields to do this job. I use Autotext entries to insert the fields where I need them.

I also use a simple VBA form to change the document properties and updates all the fields in the document.

StuartR

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