What is Forms Processing?

A Service that allows you to fill out electronic forms from your Internet browser, whether from a PC or a PDA.

How will it help me?

Use Laplink Everywhere Forms Processing services to edit predefined fields in template files and then (optionally) e-mail or fax the updated file.

What will I see in the browser?

Your browser displays a form with fields for you to enter customized text. Fields may have a default added which you can change when necessary.

How do I set up Forms Processing?

1. Start with the document that is your form. (If this form isn’t in an electronic format, you’ll need to do this first.)
2. Save a new copy of this document since you will be editing it to create your Forms Processing template.

3. Review the template and create a list of the locations where you want to add in customized data. Things like customer’s names, or quantities of an item.
4. Consider how the template is currently formatted. Perhaps you have added a line where a customer’s name is added, or you have used quotation marks, or you have used a table, etc. Some of this formatting may require changes as you add in the fields for Forms Processing.
5. At the locations where you want to add in customized text (AKA create a field), use the following format that Forms Processing recognizes.

   <#tag=default#>

   Note: Remember to remove any unnecessary formatting.

   For example,

   

   now becomes

   

What is a field?

Fields are used to add customized text into your document template. Here are the parts of a field:

<# - This says where the field starts.

tag - This is the name for the field. You see this in the browser when you process the form.

=default - If a field usually has the same customized text, you can set a default. This means you won’t always enter the customized text, but can change it if necessary. If no default is in the template’s field, then you see an empty field in the form.

#> - This says where the field ends.

Here is the template for the form you saw at the beginning of this tutorial.

So how do I use this service?

1. Install and run Laplink Everywhere on your desktop computer. The computer must have an always-on Internet connection (or have someone connect the computer to the Internet before you try to connect.)
2. Create the template file.
3. Using an Internet browser on a PC or a PDA, connect to http://www.ll2go.com and sign into your Laplink Everywhere account.
4. Click Files in the left navigation bar and locate your template file.
5. Click the template file once, and it will appear in it's own window.

6. Click Process Form. Fill in the fields with your customized text and click Send.

7. Laplink Everywhere adds the customized text to your template and saves a new file to the same folder on your hard drive. It uses the same file name as the template, adding -x to the name. For example, the first time you use the template, the new file is named FILENAME-1.DOC. The second time you use the template, the new file name is FILENAME-2.DOC .

Now what?

You can fax the new file if you have an e-fax provider previously configured on your desktop, or you can e-mail it.

Click the new file name, and then click Send E-mail or Send fax, and follow the prompts on the screen.