Find Your Way Around the Form Editor

The window where you design your forms is split in two, with a data input side on the left and the actual form design on the right. The user interface is laid out as follows.

Left Side

The left side contains the original data received from the administrative system. The original data is viewed as ASCII text in rows and columns, or as an XML tree structure.

Right Side

The right side contains the actual form design with overlays and the ability to place text/data, change fonts and font sizes.

Menu Bar (1)

You can access all application functions and options through the various menu items.

Toolbar (2)

The toolbar provides easy access to useful tools such as Save, Print, Cut, Copy, Paste and Undo/Redo, as well as Guides, Styles and Format Painter. You can drag the toolbar to another location in Lasernet Developer.

You can use the Styles and Format Painter tools to work in the output with objects such as rearranges and shapes. On top of it, use the Format Painter tool to apply and further manage formatting of tables in the output.

Output Zoom Bar (3)

The output zoom bar lets you control the zoom level for viewing your design. Zoom in for greater detail or zoom out to get an overview of your page. You can drag the output zoom bar to another location in Lasernet Form Editor.

Property Bar (4)

The property bar contains tools and settings for changing font type, size, color and typeface. It also contains tools for changing the justification and positioning of text boxes. You can drag the property bar to another location in Lasernet Developer.

Server Bar (5)

The server bar allows selecting a server instance added in the configuration. As a result, JobInfos created for that server instance become available in the Form Editor application for the testing purpose.

Sheet Tab (6)

The sheet tabs are available in the bottom left hand corner. The number of sheets shown depends on the number of copies made. The sheets can have different destinations. As can be seen above, there are three more sheets in addition to the original, these are Copy, Mail and Archive. Sheets are opened by clicking the relevant tab. You can add, copy or access sheet options by right-clicking the sheet bar. The first ten sheets can also be selected by using CTRL+1, CTRL+2, etc.

Page Tab (7)

On the bottom right hand corner there are four tabs: First Page, Middle Page, Last Page and Single Page. These tabs allow the user to create a form which has different designs according to the number of pages generated for a specific report.

• First Page: The first page of the finished print

• Middle Page: All pages between the first and the last page of the finished print

• Last Page: The last page of the finished print

• Single Page: The first and only page. This design is used if the finished print only consists of one page.

Pages are opened by clicking the relevant tab. Right-clicking the page tab allows access to additional page options. Pages can also be selected using ALT+1, ALT+2, ALT+3 and ALT+4.

Developer Toolbar (8)

The developer toolbar provides easy access to various tools for: defining criteria, creating JobInfos, rearranging input texts, defining conditional areas, patterns, inserting static text, lines, shapes and images into the form design.

Status Bar (9)

The status bar is located in the bottom left-hand corner of the window and provides information about rows and columns in the input sheet and the X and Y co-ordinates in the form design.

The View Menu

The Lasernet Form Editor has a selection of additional functions in the View menu for assisting in the design process.

Show Property Editor

This option opens a third pane in the form window to edit the properties of a selected item.

Show Thumbnails

This option opens a third pane in the form window to view thumbnails of the sheet pages. Here you can quickly scroll through the thumbnails and select the required page for editing.

If the sheet is combined or mixed (see Combine Sheet Output), all pages of the combined or mixed document are shown in the pane.

Show Grab JobInfos

This option opens a third pane in the form window to view available Grab JobInfos. For more details, see View Grab JobInfos on the Add Grab Files to a Form page.

Show Patterns

Selecting a check box next to the Patterns command on the View menu opens the Patterns pane in the form window to view and manage available patterns as well as objects added to these patterns or a sheet.

If you select a pattern on the Patterns pane, all the objects belonging to this pattern become yellow-highlighted.

Show Objects

This option opens a third pane in the form window to view available named objects. To open the Objects pane, on the View menu, select the Objects checkbox.

Show Logger

The Logger Window provides low-level information and error messages whilst working with a project. The logger window opens once the Logger checkbox is selected on the View menu.

Show Log Events

This feature becomes active if the Logger checkbox is selected on the View menu. It allows you to select which log events should be displayed in the logger window. You can choose to show or hide the following categories of events:

• System

• Error

• Transaction

• Job

• JobInfo

• Debug

• Custom

Show Object Boxes/Guides/Margins

It is possible to show the guide elements of your form on your output pages to aid in the design process (no additional output is generated). Simply select the desired element check box(es) on the View menu to display them in the output. The fewer object boxes that are checked, the closer your output pages will look to the finished / generated document.

To show/hide outlines for all available entities, select/clear the All checkbox on the View menu.