Creating an adaptive form

Last update: June 24, 2024

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Adobe recommends using the modern and extensible data capture Core Componentsfor creating new Adaptive Formsor adding Adaptive Forms to AEM Sites pages. These components represent a significant advancement in Adaptive Forms creation, ensuring impressive user experiences. This article describes older approach to author Adaptive Forms using foundation components.

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Create an adaptive form

Follow these steps to create an adaptive form.

  1. Access Experience Manager Forms Author instance at https://'[server]:[port]'/<custom-context-if-any>.

  2. Enter your credentials on the Experience Manager login page.

    After you are logged in, in the upper-left corner, select Adobe Experience Manager > Forms > Forms & Documents.

    NOTE
    For a default installation, the login is admin and the password is admin.

  3. Select Create and select Adaptive Form.

  4. An option to select a template appears. For more information about templates, see Adaptive form templates. Select a template to select it and select Next.

  5. An option to ‘Add Properties’ appears. Specify the values for following property fields. The Title and Name fields are mandatory:

    • Title: Specifies the display name of the form. The title helps you identify the form in the Experience Manager Forms user interface.
    • Name: Specifies the name of the form. A node with the specified name is created in the repository. As you start typing a title, value for the name field is automatically generated. You can change the suggested value. The name field can include only alphanumeric characters, hyphens, and underscores. All the invalid inputs are replaced with a hyphen.
    • Description: Specifies the detailed information about the form.
    • Tags: Specifies tags to uniquely identify the adaptive form. Tags help in searching the form. To create tags, type new tag names in the Tags box.

  6. You can create an adaptive form based on one of following form models:

    You can configure these from the Form Model tab on the Add Properties page. By default, the form model selected is None.

  7. Select Create. An adaptive form is created and a dialog to open the form for editing appears.

    Once you have finished specifying all the properties, click Create. An adaptive form is created and a dialog to open the form for editing appears.

    Once you have finished specifying all the properties, click Create. An adaptive form is created and a dialog to open the form for editing appears.

  8. Select Open to open the newly created form in a new tab. The form opens for editing and displays the contents available in the template. It also displays the sidebar to customize the newly created form according to the needs.

    Based on the type of adaptive form, the form elements present in the associated XFA form template, XML schema, or JSON schema are displayed in the Data Model Objects tab of the Content Browser in the sidebar. You can also drag-drop these elements to build your adaptive form.

    For information about adaptive form authoring interface and available components, see Introduction to authoring adaptive forms.

    NOTE
    Allow pop up windows in your browser to open the newly created form in a new tab.

Create an adaptive form based on a form data model

Experience Manager Forms data integration lets you integrate multiple data sources and bring their entities and services together to create a form data model. It is an extension of JSON schema. You can use a form data model to create an adaptive form. The entities or data model objects configured in a form data model are available as data model objects for form authoring. They are bound to respective data sources and used to prefill a form and write submitted data back to the respective data sources. You can also call services configured in a form data model using adaptive form rules.

To use a form data model for creating an adaptive form:

  1. In Form Model tab on Add Properties screen, select Form Data Model in the Select From drop-down list.

    create-af-1-1

  2. Select to expand Select Form Data Model. All available form data models are listed.

    Select a from data model.

    create-af-2-1

NOTE
You can also change the form data model for an adaptive form. For detailed steps, see Edit Form Model properties of an adaptive form.

Create an adaptive form based on an XFA Form template

You can repurpose your XFA form templates to create adaptive forms. To repurpose, upload and associate an XFA form template with an adaptive form. The elements of the Form Template (XFA form) are made available for use in the content finder at the time of adaptive form authoring. From the Content Finder, you can drag-and-drop the form template elements on the form.

Create an adaptive form based on XML or JSON schema

XML and JSON schemas represent the structure in which data is produced or consumed by the back-end system in your organization. You can associate a schema to an adaptive form and use its elements to add dynamic content to the adaptive form. The elements of the schema are available in the Data Model Object tab of the content browser for authoring adaptive forms. You can drag-drop the schema elements to build the form.

See the following documents to understand how to design XML or JSON schema for authoring adaptive forms.

Do the following to use XML or JSON schema as form model for an adaptive form:

  1. On the Add Properties step of adaptive form creation page, select on the Form Model tab.

  2. In the Form Model tab, select Schema from the Select From drop-down field.

  3. Select Select Schema and do one of the following:

    • Upload from disk - Select this option and select Upload Schema Definition to browse and upload an XML schema or JSON schema from your file system. The uploaded schema file resides with the form and is not accessible to other adaptive forms.
    • Search in repository - Select this option to select from the list of schema definition files available in the repository. Select the XML or JSON schema file as form model. The selected schema is associated with the form by reference and is accessible for use in other adaptive forms.
    CAUTION
    Ensure that the JSON schema filename ends with .schema.json. For example: mySchema.schema.json

    Selecting XML or JSON schema
    Figure: Selecting XML or JSON schema

  4. (For XML schema only) After you select or upload an XML Schema, specify a root element of the selected XSD file to map with the adaptive form.

    Selecting XSD root element
    Figure: Selecting XSD root element

NOTE
You can also change the schema for an adaptive form. For detailed steps, see Edit Form Model properties of an adaptive form.

Adaptive form templates

A template provides a basic structure and defines appearance (layouts and styles) of an adaptive form. It has pre-formatted components containing certain properties and content structure.

In addition, you can use the template editor to create your own templates. For more information about working with templates, see Adaptive form templates.

NOTE
When you open an adaptive form created using the advanced template for editing, an error message appears. The advanced template has a Signature Step component and Adobe Sign is enabled for it by default. Create and select an Adobe Sign cloud configuration and configure a signer to resolve the error.

Edit Form Model properties of an adaptive form

Adaptive forms are created without a form model (using the None option for form model) or using a form model such as a form template, XML schema or JSON schema, or form data model. You can change the form model for an adaptive form from None to another form model. For adaptive form based on a form model, you can choose another form template, XML schema, JSON schema, or form data model for the same form model. However, you cannot change from one form model to another.

  1. Select the adaptive form and select the Properties icon.

  2. Open the Form Model tab and do one the following.

    • If the adaptive form is without a form model, you can choose another form model and accordingly select a form template, XML or JSON schema, or form data model.
    • If the adaptive form is based on a form model, you can choose another form template, XML or JSON schema, or form data model for the same form model.

  3. Select Save to save the properties.

Auto save an adaptive form

By default, the contents of an adaptive form are saved on a user action, such as on pressing the save button. You can also configure an adaptive form to automatically start saving the content based on an event or time-interval. The auto save option is helpful in:

  • Automatically saving the content for anonymous and logged-in users
  • Saving the content of a form without or minimal user intervention
  • Start saving content of a form based on a user event
  • Saving the content of a form repeatedly after a specified time interval

Enable Auto Save for an adaptive form

By default, the auto save option is not enabled. You can enable the auto save option from the Auto Save tab of an adaptive form. The Auto Save tab also provides several other configuration options. Perform the following steps to enable and configure the auto save option for an adaptive form:

  1. To access the auto-save section in the properties, select a component, then select field-level > Adaptive Form Container, and then select cmppr .

  2. In the Auto Save section, Enable the auto-save option.

  3. In the Adaptive Form Event box, specify 1 or TRUE to automatically start saving the form when the form is loaded in the browser. You can also specify a conditional expression for an event, which when triggered and returns true, starts saving the content of the form.

  4. Specify the Trigger. Auto-save is triggered based on your configuration. Your options are:

    • Time based: Select the option to start saving the content based on a specific time interval.
    • Event based: Select the option to start saving the content based when an event is triggered.

    When you select a trigger, Strategy Configuration box is enabled. Strategy Configuration box lets you:

    • Specify a time interval if you select Time based trigger.
    • Specify an event name if you select Event based trigger.

  5. (Time-based autosave only) Perform the following steps to configure options for the Time-based autosave.

    1. In the Auto save on this interval box, specify the time interval in seconds. The form is saved repeatedly after the number of seconds specified in the interval box elapse.

  6. (Event-based auto save only) Perform the following steps to configure options for Event-based auto save.

    1. In the Auto save after this event box, specify a GuideBridge event. The form is saved every time the expression evaluates to TRUE.

  7. (Optional) To automatically save the content for anonymous users, select the Enable Autosave for anonymous users option, and click OK.

    NOTE
    For auto save option to work for anonymous users, ensure that you configure the Forms Common Configuration Service to allow all users to preview, verify, and sign forms.
    To configure the service, go to Adobe Experience Manager Web Console configuration at https://'[server]:[port]'system/console/configMgr and edit the Forms Common Configuration Service to choose the All Users option in the Allow field, and save the configuration.

How to rename an AEM Adaptive Form ?

To rename an adaptive form, perform the following steps:

  1. Select an adaptive form in your AEM Forms user interface.

  2. Click on the Properties located on the upper rail.

    Properties

  3. Change the name of the form in the Title tab, as shown in the image below.

  4. Click Save and Close.

    Rename an AEM Adaptive Form

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