Protected Document: Multiple Hyperlinks

[Andrew H]

I want provide 2 hyperlinks within a protected document. More specifically, I want to provide a hyperlink H1 that takes the user to location P1 in document X as well as a hyperlink H2 that takes the use to location P2 in document X.

I have succeeded in getting the first hyperlink working as per instructions provided here:

http://word.mvps.org/faqs/tblsfldsfms/HLinksInForms.htm

However, when I create the second hyperlink H2, the link sends me to P1, not P2 when the document is protected, even though I am otherwise ensuring that the "destination" of H2 is indeed P2, not P1.

[macropod]

Without seeing the document in question, this will be difficult to diagnose.

Can you attach a document to a post with some representative data (delete anything sensitive)? You do this via the paperclip symbol on the 'Go Advanced' tab.

[Andrew H]

Originally Posted by macropod

Without seeing the document in question, this will be difficult to diagnose.

Can you attach a document to a post with some representative data (delete anything sensitive)? You do this via the paperclip symbol on the 'Go Advanced' tab.

Here is a simple document I created that illustrates the problem. Even though there are two distinct hyperlinks, each defined to send the user to different bookmark, both hyperlinks take you to the first of the two drop-downs when the document is protected.

[macropod]

Hi Andrew,

What your document demonstrates is not that both hyperlinks go to the same destination but that, when you try to select anything in a protected range before the first formfield, Word takes you to the first formfield.

Try the attached revision to your document. I've deleted the MACROBUTTON fields as the 'followlink' macro they referred to was missing from the document and so would not work even when the document was unprotected.

[Andrew H]

Originally Posted by macropod

Hi Andrew,

What your document demonstrates is not that both hyperlinks go to the same destination but that, when you try to select anything in a protected range before the first formfield, Word takes you to the first formfield.

Try the attached revision to your document. I've deleted the MACROBUTTON fields as the 'followlink' macro they referred to was missing from the document and so would not work even when the document was unprotected.

Great, but how did you do this? I tried to do the same thing you did - I examined the "field" codes and bookmarks in your file and apparently reproduced them. When the document is locked, the links do not function at all (however, the links work properly when the document is unlocked).

Are you sure you did nothing over and above what you say you did - delete the MACROBUTTON fields?

[macropod]

Hi Andrew,

I replaced your manual page break with a 'Next Page' Section break, then left the first Section unprotected when applying the forms protection.

[Andrew H]

Originally Posted by macropod

Hi Andrew,

I replaced your manual page break with a 'Next Page' Section break, then left the first Section unprotected when applying the forms protection.

Hi. I did this and it worked. Thanks.

However it appears that what I really want to do is impossible - lock the entire document and yet still allow the user to use hyperlinks. I wonder why it is (apparently) not possible to do this. Or, more generally, why must the user be "forced" to the first form in a protected document (on mouse click) when that user may well wish to "navigate" through the document using the cursor?

I realize, of course that the user can indeed navigate through a locked document using the arrow keys. However, I suspect you will agree that users are deeply accustomed to using the mouse (with clicks) to navigate through a document.

Obviously the advantage of the present functionality is that users more or less cannot help but go to the first form in a locked document. Fair enough, but this also robs the user (in my view anyway) of the highly desirable capability to otherwise navigate freely through a locked document using the mouse buttons. Perhaps the reasoning is as follows: If users are allowed to "click their way" through a locked document, they will expect to be allowed to alter that document.

Anyway, I very much appreciate your assistance and suggest this item is "solved" (in the sense that it appears that you have given me the "best possible" solution to my problem, even if it is not strictly what I was hoping for).

[macropod]

To achieve the hyperlink effect, you could put formfields at the start of the document, similar to what you originally tried with the macrobutton fields, that trigger an on-exit macro to take you to another location in the document - provided of course that that location is itself another formfield or an unprotected Section.

With forms protection, there are numerous other editing restrictions that are placed on the document in addition to not being able to select protected text. For example, you can't insert a picture into even an unprotected Section of the document. Neither can you use spell-checking.

Just speculating, I'd guess MS originally conceived this functionality as being used in documents that would typically only be a few pages long or, if longer, would have all the user input being done in the first few pages and cross-references being used for replication elsewhere. Accordingly, the only navigation thought necessary was via the tab key or the scroll bar.

Given that you're using Office 2010, though, I suggest you investigate the use of content controls. These give you much greater flexibility and can even be used without protecting the document.