Introduction
In the daily operations of your business, you may often find yourself in a situation where external stakeholders need access to certain information or functionalities within your Empress instance. Whether it’s job applicants, customers, suppliers, or any other external entity, Empress provides a secure and efficient way to grant them necessary access through the Web Forms feature.
This guide is designed to walk you through the use of this feature, clearly explaining how to create, customize, and manage Web Forms in Empress, all without the use of technical jargon.
Understanding Empress Interfaces
Empress provides two primary interfaces: Desk View and Web View.
- Desk View serves your internal users, such as employees, and provides them with regular access to the Empress system.
- Web View is designed for external users who need occasional interaction with your Empress system. The Web Forms we’re focusing on today are a part of the Web View interface.
How to Create a Web Form
Creating a Web Form in Empress is a simple process:
- Navigate to: Home > Website > Web Site > Web Form
- Select the DocType you wish to base your Web Form on. The route will be automatically set based on your Web Form’s title.
- Add an introduction text if you wish to display a friendly message above your form.
- Add the necessary fields from the selected DocType to your form. You can also change the label for these fields. Keep the number of fields to a minimum to make the form easier to fill in.
- Finally, click on See on Website in the sidebar to view your newly created Web Form.
Configuring Web Form Settings
On the right side of the Web Form creation page, you’ll find several checkboxes that allow you to customize the form’s settings. Here’s what each one does:
- Published: When enabled, the Web Form becomes accessible to external users.
- Login Required: When enabled, users must log in before they can fill out the form.
- Route to Success Link: When enabled, users are redirected to a success page after submitting the form.
- Allow Edit: When disabled, users cannot edit the form once it’s been saved.
- Allow Multiple: When enabled, users can create multiple records using the form.
- Show as Grid: When enabled, the form displays records in a table format.
- Allow Delete: When enabled, users can delete the records they have created.
- Allow Comments: When enabled, users can add comments to the created form.
- Allow Print: When enabled, users can print the form.
- Allow Incomplete Forms: When enabled, users can submit the form even if they haven’t filled out all the fields.
Additional Web Form Features
Empress also provides several advanced features to further enhance your Web Forms:
- Sidebar: You can display contextual links in a sidebar on your Web Form using the Sidebar Settings.
- Child Tables: You can add child tables to your Web Forms, much like regular forms.
- Payment Gateway Integration: You can integrate a Payment Gateway into your Web Forms, allowing users to make payments.
- Portal User Roles: From version 11 onwards, Empress allows you to assign roles to website users and control their access to the Desk View interface.
- Custom Scripts and CSS: You can customize your Web Forms with scripts to validate inputs, auto-fill values, and more. You can also customize the look and feel of your forms with your own CSS.
- Actions: You can display a success message to users upon successful form submission and redirect them to a specific URL.
When a user submits a Web Form, the data is stored in the corresponding document or doctype within Empress.
To further customize your Web Forms, you can refer to the Empress Web Forms Documentation. This useful feature allows you to streamline and enhance your interaction with external stakeholders, making your business processes more efficient and user-friendly.