Obsolete The information herein describes template technology which has been replaced. See workflow technology for current custom template information. Most messages taken prior to 9-1-2015 utilize this older technology. This information is available to document these past messages.

Overview Type-2

Managing editable forms

Telephone Message Pad starts you with 4 widely used message taking forms. These forms can be used as is. They are system-wide and may not be edited or deleted. However, you can make a copy (clone) and then edit the clone. That clone is private to your account. All users in your account may be able to use the cloned form, where it will appears as a choice in the Forms menu for your account.

In this screenshot, we see that the four system-wide forms: appointment, contact, free_form, and while_out. The contact_3 form is a clone and has been defined for this account. You can pick your own name for a form provided the name is not already in use.

When edit is selected for a form, you are first taken to the standard interface. From there, you can reach the advanced interface. Both are described below.

Once a form has been created and used, we recommend that the form not have major edits or be deleted. Doing so, will create issues in displaying historical messages which use the form. If you need to make major revisions, you may clone your current form and edit that clone.

Standard Interface

The Standard interface provides power to edit display fields while hiding much of the complexity of template editing. See the advanced interface below for full access to a form template.

A template targets at least three different output modes so, of necessity, there need to be three different definitions for how each field is handled. These definitions are often highly similar but need not be. The three targets are:

• the data entry form
• the email message(s) sent out
• the history record

Also, a format conversion is needed for messages sent to email-to-texting (instant messaging) gateways but that conversion is handled internally by code and is not editable.

The Standard Interface opens with each displayable field on a line. You can move the field up or down. You can edit or delete the field though care should be taken since some fields are used in searching. If the field is deleted, a search cannot find the record using that key as a search term even if an equivalent field with a different name is defined.

The Discard all changes button undoes all changes made in the Standard or Advanced interface since the edit was entered. The Finished returns to the form manager and retains all the changes (if any) made. If you have no changes, it does not matter which of the two buttons you use to finish editing.

Standard interface field definition screen

Here we show the result of clicking the "edit" link for the "Header" field. The entry, SMTP (email send), and mail_to components of the Header definition are shown in each of 3 sections. Within each section, the HTML definition of the component is shown and below that in gray is a visualization of how the line is displayed.

Even if you do not know HTML, you should be able to pick out where the text, "While you were out" in this case, lies and edit that. The more HTML you know, the greater the control you have.

Click "Save this edit" to return to the Standard interface opening screen. If you made a mistake you can re-edit that specific field or Discard all Changes from the Standard interface opening screen. Also, as a more drastic measure, from the form manage screen, you can delete the entire template and re-clone from an original.

Advanced Interface

The Advanced interface provides access to the raw template definition file. See the standard interface above for more user friendly interface with much of the power of the Advanced interface.

It is assumed that the material documented for the Standard interface has been read first, especially with regard to overall targeting of 3 different outputs formats.

Advanced interface opening screen

The UP/DOWN links allow navigating the XML hierarchy. The UP line gives a "breadcrumb trail" showing the present position. Here "template >> body" is shown. This means we are in the hierarchy as shown:

The "template" tag is the outermost set of tags and all content is subordinate to this tag.

The DOWN line shows all the tags directly within the present scope (i.e. no subordinate tags). For convenience, the list of down tags is alphabetized and not necessarily in file order.

The Discard all changes and Finished have the same meaning as for the Standard Interface. The Save button saves any changes made. We recommend descending the hierarchy before making changes. Thus, it is physically possible to scroll through a long listing such as illustrated but it is much less error prone to drill down so the entire content to be edited fits in the visible window.