Help with Word Forms

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Does anyone know of a way to control the direction or order of the tab key when using a Word form. The form has been established in a table and is protected. As you know, the default direction of the tab key in a table is left to right then down. We need to define the direction and VBA is not an option.

Chance

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I grabbed this from the Help File – perhaps it gives you some ideas. This method does include macros though so perhaps is excluded by your phrase “VB is not an option”, but it’s all I’ve got to offer.

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The TAB key doesn’t move the insertion point to the correct form field.
Depending on how your form is designed, the TAB key may not move the insertion point to the correct form field. You can specify that the insertion point automatically moves from one form field to another by using an on-exit macro.
How?

Automate your form
Any macro saved in the form template can run automatically when the insertion point enters or exits a form field. For example, if a user selects a Married check box, an exit macro could activate other related fields, such as Name of Spouse.

For information about writing macros in Visual Basic that customize the behavior of ActiveX controls, click .

Open the template that contains the form you want to change.

Remove protection from the form template by clicking Protect Form on the Forms toolbar.

Create the macros you want to use, and store them in the form template.
If another template contains macros you want to use, copy them into the form template.

How?

Double-click the form field you want to assign a macro to.

To run a macro when the insertion point enters the form field, click the macro in the Entry box.
To run a macro when the insertion point exits the form field, click the macro in the Exit box.

Note If you store the entry and exit macros in your Normal template and then distribute a form to others, the entry and exit macros may not run because the macros won’t be available to the users. You must store macros you use in the form in the form template.

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Thanks phanks …. I think I can use this since it should be transparent to the users who are barely computer literate. BobD’s suggestion is essentially the same. I’ve tried it but am running into a error in code that I can’t seem to figure out what causing it. See my post below please.

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*** Geoff W. URL markup added ***

Look at Q159898

http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/ar…s/Q159/8/96.ASP

Works with 97 & 2000.

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Bob Thanks for your response …. I’ve tried this but am running into a code error that I can’t seem to troubleshoot. See my post below please for details.

Chance

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Here’s the test code ….
Sub TabOrder()
Dim sTabTo As String
Dim dlgForm As Dialog
Set dlgForm = Dialogs(wdDialogFormFieldOptions)
Select Case LCase(dlgForm.Name)
Case “Text1”
sTabTo = “Text2”
Case “Text2”
sTabTo = “Text3”
Case “Text3”
sTabTo = “Text4”
Case “Text4”
sTabTo = “Text5”
Case “Text5”
sTabTo = “Text6”
Case “Text6”
sTabTo = “Text7”
Case “Text7”
sTabTo = “Text8”
Case “Text8”
sTabTo = “Text9”
Case “Text9”
sTabTo = “Text10”
Case “Text10”
sTabTo = “Text11”
Case “Text11”
sTabTo = “Text12”
Case “Text12”
sTabTo = “Text13”
Case “Text13”
sTabTo = “Text14”
Case “Text14”
sTabTo = “Text15”
Case “Text15”
sTabTo = “Text16”
Case “Text16”
sTabTo = “Text17”
Case “Text17”
sTabTo = “Text18”
Case “Text18”
sTabTo = “Text1”
Case Else
End Select
ActiveDocument.Bookmarks(sTabTo).Select
End Sub

It hangs up on ActiveDocument.Bookmarks(sTabTo).select. The error is “Requested member of the collection does not exist.” as soon as I tab from Text1 form field. I’ve double checked each of the bookmarks in each of the form fields and all seem to be spelled correctly and match code references. There is also a bookmark set in each form field. Any ideas????

I appreciate your help ….

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Please reread Q159896 and you will see:

Note: Each Case statement below should be in all lower case.

Replace yours with something like the below:

Sub TabOrder()
‘
‘ TabOrder Macro
‘ Macro created 02/22/01
‘
Dim sTabTo As String
Dim dlgForm As Dialog
Set dlgForm = Dialogs(wdDialogFormFieldOptions)
Select Case LCase(dlgForm.Name)
Case “text1”
sTabTo = “text2”
Case “text2”
sTabTo = “text3”
Case “text3”
sTabTo = “text4”
Case “text4”
sTabTo = “text1”
Case Else
End Select
ActiveDocument.Bookmarks(sTabTo).Select
End Sub

This works for me w/Word97.

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Thanks Bob …. got it working just fine now … I had thought it might have something to do with the case and had tried to make that change … but what I also need to do is to have lower case for the bookmark field name in the field properties. When I made both lower case it worked.

Thanks again ……Chance

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Hi Bob:

I have a question. Why do you have to use lowercase for “text1”, etc. since the bookmark obstensibly uses “Text1”.

Thanks.

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Phil,

Only the Case statement needs lower case as shown by the note in Q159896.
“Note: Each Case statement below should be in all lower case. ”
Case “text1”
As I dislike typing I use copy/paste extensively.
The lines below produce the same results in the macro I posted above.
sTabTo = “text2”
sTabTo = “Text2”

No changes to default bookmark names were done. They are still Text1, . . .

Case “Text1” – give the error while
Case “text1” – executes properly. That’s all I know.

Bob_D

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It needs to be lower case because of the way MS designed it:

…
Select Case LCase(dlgForm.Name)
…

I guess this was to avoid case mismatches, but…

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Thanks, Bob. Maybe some day I’ll get around to learning VBA. Something to do in my spare time.

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Phil,

It seems like heavy stuff, but, to my mind, it’s WELL worth it.

You can do so much with Word with the extra help from VBA.

I first got switched on to VBA for Word when my wife came home from her travel agency, and told me how they generated standard letters for her travel agency just by entering a few fields. I had never realised (5 years ago) that something like that was possible from Word.

Since then, I’ve produced a standard set of forms for our users, where common details (name, phone, address, etc) are filled in automatically. If they change any fields, those changes are reflected in the next form they fill in.

It wan’t that hard to achieve. The quantum leap was to get the idea that it could be done.

With some knowledge, and lots of ideas, you can achieve heaps.

Just some thoughts

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Hi Geoff:

Thanks for the encouragement. I know you’re right. I’ll probably take the plunge this summer.

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I HOPE you’re talking about this summer Australian time, not summer in the North!

To start is not a big plunge. Just record a macro and see what it does. Or copy some of the simple macros posted here and run them.

To learn it all properly- that’s another story. I think we’re all learning.

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Geoff, thanks for the heads up on your forms technique and furnishing the code. Gives me something to while away the time in the sleepless wee hours.

BTW, what is the references to the Australian summer? I searched the thread on this and wondered what I missed.

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he he he – I see Phil’s one liner now about tackling his form building job in the summer. I missed that – but then it’s 4am here and I’m working lights out so as not to disturb my daughter so I guess I’m missing things. Sorry.

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k Geoff – you’ve got my attention with this statement [indent]

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Since then, I’ve produced a standard set of forms for our users, where common details (name, phone, address, etc) are filled in automatically. If they change any fields, those changes are reflected in the next form they fill in.

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[/indent] What exactly do you mean? How did you do it so that multiple forms recognized it? I have a bizillion forms to automate where fields have the same info over and over again in the same form as well as in companion forms. Can you enlighten me with your magic ways?

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OK, thanks for the encouragement to expand!

I have a standard naming for my form fields. “Name” is always the user’s name; “FullName” is always full name, etc- so that a field will always be filled in consistently.

There is an “AutoNew” in an add-in (it could be in Normal.dot if you wnated it to) which goes through every form field on the document. It ignores any fields with no names, or any field which starts with “text”, “chec”, or “drop” (default names).

If it is, for instance, “Name”, I have a look at the field “Name” in my settings name. If it exists, I insert that value of the field into that form field.

I also have another standard name- if the name starts with “texttoday” it inserts todays date- it is still modifiable if I choose to allow a form field to be filled in.

If I need form fields to be named for other reasons, I prefix the names with “text”.

Here’s the code (sorry, naming convention is not consistent):

Dim i As Integer
Dim sType As String
Dim sName As String
Dim sResult As String
Dim sStartupPath as String
Dim blnProtected As Boolean

On Error GoTo HandleErr
sStartupPath = Options.DefaultFilePath(wdStartupPath) & "settings.ini"
Application.ScreenUpdating = False
blnProtected = False
If ActiveDocument.ProtectionType = wdAllowOnlyFormFields Then
    ActiveDocument.Unprotect
    blnProtected = True
End If

For i = 1 To ActiveDocument.FormFields.Count
  sName = ActiveDocument.FormFields(i).Name
  sType = UCase(Mid(sName, 1, 4))
  If sType  "TEXT" And sType  "" And sType  "DROP" And sType  "CHEC" Then
    Selection.GoTo What:=wdGoToBookmark, Name:=sName
    sResult = Trim(System.PrivateProfileString(sStartupPath, "MS Word User", sName))
    ActiveDocument.FormFields(i).Result = sResult
  End If
  If Mid$(UCase$(sName), 1, 9) = "TEXTTODAY" Then
    ActiveDocument.FormFields(i).Result = Now
  End If
Next i

If blnProtected Then
  ActiveDocument.Protect Type:=wdAllowOnlyFormFields, noreset:=True
End If

If there’s a group of fields together, as there typically
are, I have a “macro on exit” attached to the last field
which does the revers, and stores the values back on the
ini file.

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It’ll probably because a part of the VBE engine is using the string literally, in which case (ugh!) “Text” is quite different from “text”.

I hate it when an application forces case-sensitive in one part and is insensitive in another. That may be what you’ve discovered.

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