PlayerLync Forms User Guide (MachForm)

PlayerLync Forms User Guide (MachForm) Table of Contents FORM MANAGER... 1 FORM BUILDER... 3 ENTRY MANAGER... 4 THEME EDITOR... 6 NOTIFICATIONS... 8 FORM CODE... 9 FORM MANAGER The form manager is where you manage all aspects of MachForm. Creating new forms, editing form, duplicating form, setting theme, setting payment, all can be done through this page. The form manager displays a complete list of all of your forms. Each form is listed on its own row. Clicking the row will expand all of the options available for that form. On the right section of each row, the total of today s entries will be displayed on a red background. Hovering over that block will display the latest entry submission time. Creating a New Form You can start creating a new form by clicking the green button on the top right corner labeled Create New Form. Clicking the button will take you to the Form Builder page, where you can add fields for your form. Once you re finished and have saved the form, you will be redirected back to the Form Manager page and your new form will be displayed on the list. PlayerLync Forms Manual v1.0 1

Tagging the Forms If you have a large number of forms, it is very useful to assign a tag name to each form so that you can group the forms into categories and manage them easily. You can input anything in the tag name, including spaces. Each form can be assigned multiple tag names assigned. To assign multiple tag names at once, simply input all of your tag names and separate them with commas. Filtering and Sorting On the top left corner of the Form Manager, a search box is provided for you to easily search your form. You can search your forms by form title or by tag names. The results are displayed instantly and they keywords are highlighted. You can also sort your forms based on a set of predefined conditions. Simply click the Sort By dropdown on the top right corner of the Form Manager. Tip: You can display the total entries for each form by sorting your form by Total Entries. Enable/Disable Form Sometimes you need to temporarily close the form and not accept any entries. Clicking the Disable link on your form will do this. When you ready to accept new entries, you can activate your form again by clicking the Enable link. When the form has been disabled, a message indicating the form s status will be displayed instead of the form fields. Disabling the form is not the same thing as deleting your form. None of your data will be deleted. You can also customize the message for each of your form. Very useful for forms such as event registration form, job application form, or any other form that is time-sensitive. Personalized inactive message for each of your form would make it even more useful to your users and avoid confusions. PlayerLync Forms Manual v1.0 2

Changing Theme When you create a new form, a theme will be assigned to your form. A theme is basically a set of CSS code to control the look and feel of your form (colors, backgrounds, fonts, logo, etc.) By default, the White theme is assigned to your form. You can change the theme by clicking the Theme link and selecting a new theme from the drop-down list. There are built-in themes available and you can create your own theme by choosing the Create New Theme option. Duplicating the Form Duplicating a form will create an exact copy of the form, including all of the settings (notifications, payment, theme). However, it doesn t copy the entries that were in the original form. The new copy will have no entries. If you need to create many forms with similar fields, it s best to create a master form that contains all of the common fields. Every time you need to create a similar form, you can duplicate your master form and then modify it further. This way, you won t need to add all of the fields each time from scratch. Deleting the Form When you delete a form, all of the associated entries (including any file uploads) will be deleted as well. There is no trash/recycle bin to easily restore your forms from your admin panel. FORM BUILDER The Form Builder is the place where you will spend most of the time when building a form. Here you will be able to add fields, set validations, set the form s schedule and almost every aspect of your form s functionality. The Form Builder is divided into two main columns: The left column is the preview of your form, whereas the right column is the main interface where you can add fields, change field properties and change the properties of the form. The preview section displays a preview of your form. However, the theme is not displayed within the preview. So if you are using any theme other than the default, you will be able to see the result on the live form only. PlayerLync Forms Manual v1.0 3

Adding Fields To add fields to your form, click the field buttons on the right column of the Form Builder. You can also drag the field from the right column into the preview area of your form. ENTRY MANAGER All of your form submission data are automatically saved in the database. Using the Entry Manager, you will be able to access all of your data and edit or export the data into an Excel/text file. The Entry Manager consists of a main table that displays all the records of your entries. On the top left of the table, options to export/delete your entries are provided. On the top right of the table, there are options to let you filter your entries and display the selected fields. On the bottom right of the table, a drop-down menu to sort your entries by any fields is available. View Entry Detail To view the detailed information on an entry, click the row you would like to see from the Entry Manager. A page with the details of the submission will then be displayed. Along with the data submitted by your users, you will also be able to see their IP address and the time of the submission. Editing Entry When viewing the details of an entry, you can edit the entry by clicking the Edit link on the top right corner of that page. Every time you update an entry, the Date Updated field will be updated as well. If your form has multiple pages, you will be able to edit the data from all of the pages at once. PlayerLync Forms Manual v1.0 4

Forward an Entry If you need to resend an entry to your email address or any email address, you can do so by clicking the Email link on the View Entry page. You can enter multiple email addresses. Simply separate them with commas. Filtering Entries The filter entries feature is one of the most powerful functionalities of MachForm. You can filter your entries based on one or more conditions. Click on the Filter Entries link on top of your entries and the Filter Builder will be displayed. Select the field you would like to use as the filter from the dropdown. Add more conditions by clicking the plus icon on the right. Once you have finished, click Apply Filter to apply the filter to your entries. All entries matched your filters will be displayed. Note that by default MachForm will remember your filter, even though you have logged out from the admin panel. If you need to clear the filter, simply click the Clear Filter link. Clearing the filter won t remove any of your data. Displaying Selected Fields The space on the Entry Manager is limited, so it s always a good idea to only display the most important fields. Click the Select Fields menu on the top right corner of the entries table to select the fields you would like to display. Exporting Entries MachForm allows you to export all of your entries into an Excel file, CSV file, or tab-separated text file. Simply select the entries you would like to export and then click the export menu. If you don t select any entries, it will export all of your entries. If you have a filter enabled, MachForm will apply that filter before exporting all of the entries. PlayerLync Forms Manual v1.0 5

Ordering Fields To move a field to any position on your form, simply click the field on your form preview area and drag it up or down to the desired position. Field Properties When you click a field on the form preview area, the field properties tab of that field will be displayed. Depending on the field type, the field properties tab will display any applicable setting for that particular field, including the label, rules, size, options, and guidelines, etc. You can click on the Help icon next to each option/property to access detailed information regarding the property. THEME EDITOR The Theme Editor allows you to visually adjust the look and feel of your form, such as the logo, fonts, backgrounds, and borders, etc. The Theme Editor consists of two main areas. The top area is the style category buttons and the bottom area provides a preview of your form. Clicking on any of the category buttons will display all related property buttons for that category. You can then click on each of the properties buttons to display the properties tab. Depending on the category, each property button will display different properties tabs, such as color picker, font selector, etc. When you change any of those settings, the result will be displayed instantly on the form preview area. Creating a New Theme To create a new theme, click the Edit Theme menu on the main navigation or select Create New Theme from the dropdown on the top right corner of the Theme Editor. Build your theme by adjusting the properties as needed, and then click the Save Theme button. Editing a Theme To edit a theme, select the theme name from the dropdown. The preview of the selected theme will be displayed, and you can continue adjusting the theme. Once you are finished, click the Save Theme button to apply the changes. Adding Custom CSS Code There are times you will need to use custom CSS code to fine-tune your theme or perform specific tasks, which cannot be done with the Theme Editor (such as aligning a few fields into a single line). PlayerLync Forms Manual v1.0 6

The Theme Editor allows you to add any valid CSS code to your theme. On the Theme Editor, click the dropdown on the right top corner and select the Advanced menu. You will be prompted to enter your CSS code. Once you have finished, make sure to save your theme to apply any changes. Using a Theme Once you have created a theme, you can apply the theme to any form you want. To apply a theme to one particular form, go to the Form Manager and click the Theme icon. Select the theme you would like to use and click the Save button. Refresh your form to see the result. If the new theme has not been applied, delete your browser cache and then refresh your form again. Form Properties Similar to the field properties tab, the Form Properties controls almost any aspect of the form. You can change the form s title, language, processing options, protection and limit, schedule, etc. You can click on the Help icon next to each option/property to access detailed information regarding the property. Creating a Multi-Page Form When you have a form with many fields, it s a good practice to split your form into multiple pages to ensure that the length of your form won t overwhelm your clients and cause them to abandon your form. Creating a multi-page form is very simple within MachForm. Simply drag a Page Break field into the form preview area and a new page will be created. You can then drag/add fields into each page. PlayerLync Forms Manual v1.0 7

NOTIFICATIONS The email notification feature of MachForm is very powerful. You can customize every aspect of it (sender, receiver, content template, and auto-responder). The email notification interface consists of a pane containing two block of settings. The first block is the settings to send the email notifications to your inbox. The second block is the settings pane to send an auto-responder email to the users who fill out the form. You can enable any, all, or none of these notifications. Setting Up Notifications When you create a new form, by default MachForm won t set up that form to send the submissions to any email address. You need to enable the notifications and set the destination email address to do this. To enable notifications, simply check the checkbox for the notification you would like to receive. For example, if you need to receive notifications in your email inbox, check the Send Notification Emails to My Inbox. You will be prompted to enter your email address. You can send the notification to multiple email addresses; simply separate them with commas. Customizing the Sender s Address By default, MachForm will send the notification to you using the email address no-reply@yourdomain.com. You can change this to any email address you want, including the email address that is entered by the user who fills in the form. This is quite handy when you need to build something like a contact form so that the message will looks as it was coming from the user email address directly. Customizing the Subject and Content The subject and the content of the notification are fully customizable. You can use template variables to insert form data in the subject or content. You can also use HTML code, along with CSS, to customize your email content. PlayerLync Forms Manual v1.0 8

Sending Auto-responders An auto-responder email is an email that is sent to the person who filled in the form after the form has been successfully submitted. Usually, the auto-responder is used to provide confirmation or receipt of the user s submission. MachForm autoresponder is also fully customizable, with the subject, content, and sender s address - everything- able to be configured. To be able using auto-responder, make sure that your form has at least one email field type. You can then select the email field you would like to send the auto-responder to. FORM CODE MachForm is designed to create forms that can be integrated easily with your website. Using the multiple embed code options, you will be able to use the form in your site using any method you are familiar with. The code manager displays multiple form codes that you can easily copy and paste into your web page. By changing the Form Code Type dropdown, different embed code options will be displayed to suit your needs. Choosing a Form Code There are six embed codes you can choose to use in the form. These are JavaScript Code, IFrame Code, PHP Form File, PHP Form Code, Simple Link and Popup Link. Depending on your website and the CMS you are using, one embed code might prove to be better than the others. Using JavaScript Code The JavaScript Code is the recommended code to embed the form in your web page. Using this code, the form will blend seamlessly with your web page and most people won t even notice it. Under the hood, the JavaScript code basically displays your form inside an iframe. However, the JavaScript is smart enough to expand the height of your iframe as needed. As this code is intended to integrate the form into your existing web page seamlessly, the form s background, border, and logo header won t be displayed. Using IFrame Code If you are using CMS that doesn t allow the use of JavaScript code, then this iframe code should be your second choice. You might need to adjust the height of the iframe manually so that the Submit button of your form can be displayed properly. PlayerLync Forms Manual v1.0 9