SharePointers: When a SharePoint List Just Isn't Enough

By Nicola Young

If you are one of the many Microsoft customers who has purchased MOSS Enterprise, then hopefully you are aware of an included feature called Forms Services. But do you really know the kind of power it can bring to your organization?

Most organizations still have paper forms all over the office, such as expense reports, vacation requests, new employee access request forms, change request forms and the like. Typically, there are multiple versions of these forms, and each form goes through the unnecessary process of the user printing it out and filling it in, sending it to the correct resource within the company, possibly an approval process, and then the form is entered into the appropriate system. This can all be simplified using InfoPath 2007 and Forms Services. Here are some quick tips for utilizing:

You only need to purchase the InfoPath 2007 client for the users in your company who will be creating and editing the form templates. Everyone else will use their browser to fill out the form through Forms Services.


The following browsers are supported: Microsoft Internet Explorer 6.0 and 7.0; Firefox 1.5; Mozilla 1.7; Netscape 7.2 (only on Unix/Linux) and 8.1; and Safari 2.0 (only on Macintosh).


Why recreate a form if you already have it designed in Microsoft Word 2007 or Microsoft Excel 2007? InfoPath 2007 includes a feature that allows you to import in the template previously created in Microsoft Word 2007 or Microsoft Excel 2007. You can opt to either import in the layout only or the layout and form fields.


To ensure your form will render correctly in the browser, be sure to run the Design checker located on the Tools menu. The Design checker will inform you of any items that will cause the form not to load in the browser, as well as any items that will not render correctly in the browser.


When publishing a form to SharePoint, you have three options: document library, site content type or administrator-approved. The document library option will make the form the template for the document library. The site content type option will create the form template as a content type and allow you to use the form in several document or form libraries, yet manage the form in one single location. The administrator-approved form template option will place the form template in the form library in Central Administration. Once approved, the form can be activated through a feature on any of the sites you wish to use it on. This option will need to be selected anytime you use code in the form.


The property promotion functionality allows you to promote fields from the form to columns on the library. This will allow you to then create views using the fields from the form. You can choose to promote all of the fields from the form or only a select few.

These were just some quick tips to get you started. For more information visit the Microsoft InfoPath Team blog, and read a step-by-step walk-through of publishing your first form.

Nicola Young is a consultant with SharePoint 911.