Setting up a Smart Form

Overview

Smart forms can be applied to all projects to aid standardisation and consistency of data capture and display reporting. Smart forms can be altered at any time as processes, terminology and requirements change over time. 

The ability to create, edit and delete Smart Forms lies with those users who have administrator level access. The visibility of Smart Forms (whole or part of) can also be configured to reflect project flow and access rights. 

Smart Forms are broken down into three sections:

• Pages
• Groups
• Fields

There can be multiple fields within a group and there can be multiple groups per page.  The page is the Smart Form itself. 

This functionality can be accessed on Administration menu and selecting Pages-Groups-Fields in Smart Forms. 

Pages

When setting up a new page, use the Add button to set up the name of the page. Other options are available such as display settings and iteration frequency.

If the page is to be displayed to some users but not all users, click the “Based on Formula” to set the display conditions. We will cover example display formulas later in the document. 

Groups

Every smart form must have at least 1 group, and there is no upper limit to the number of groups on a smart form page. These are used to break up the page into logical sections for the user. 

For example, when creating a Business Case document, one group would be for details of the user submitting the document ie name, date of submission etc. and another group for the written detail of the project. 

To set up a new group, click the Add button and name the new group. You can also choose how many columns the group has (maximum of 4). If you have multiple groups on a page, remember they are displayed vertically, and can have different number of columns per group. 

You can use the “Hide Header Row” option to hide the group separator. This can be useful when wanting 2 or more groups to appear as part of a single group for the reader.  

NB: Remember to use the ‘Page’ drop down to put the group on your chosen page.

Fields

These are the data capture fields and there are many options available. Here you can name the field (Label), choose which group the field belongs in, the type of field and additional options. 

These additional options change based on the field type selected as not all options are applicable to all field types. 

Step 1:  Enter a Label to give the field a name.

• For simple smart forms, the default field type is Text. The Textbox Rows drop down determines the size of the box.
• The Column drop down at the bottom of the screen allows you to place the field into a column.
• You can even set each text box to display a prompt such as ‘Please enter text here…’ – This is found on the field option ‘Default Value’

Step 2:  Use the Group drop down to add it to the group you want.

Step 3:  Click Save and Close