I occasionally need to recreate a PDF form in Word, and I have a few questions about functionality and limitations.

I place a graphic of the original form in the header/footer area, and I add each form field into a frame for positioning. I have problems when I need to add/change fields as it appears that the 'Tab Order' is based on the order which the fields/frames are created (If I create or paste a new frame/field, that field will be added to the end of the tab order; if I drag-copy an existing frame/field, that field will appear in the tab order after the field it was copied from)

I don't see any way to move frames up or down within the Zorder, or to set a tab order. Is there any way to reset the existing order, or do I need to cut/paste each field if I end up needing to add a field at a particular place or rearrange the order of fields?

Also, is there a way to select more than 1 frame/field? If I need to move or copy an entire section, having to do it one field at a time is very tedious.



It appears to me that checkboxes cannot be mutually exclusive (i.e. Male or Female) - is there any way to limit a group to 1 selection (I cannot use Macros, as I don't have control over the platform or version that it will be used or the security settings that will be set)

I also dont' see any way to make the frames transparent, is this true? Currently, I need to redraw the lines in the form over top of the fields, which is also very time consuming especially when the client makes changes.

Any help with these issues would be most appreciated.

Well, that appears to not be consistent. The form I am working on was tabbing properly a while ago, and now the tab order is not correct. I have not added/removed any fields during that time, just adjusted their size and positions. Even cutting and pasting the frames again in the order that I want them to tab does not reset the order to what I want.

Excuse my rant, but why the hell are forms in Word so extremely unusable? 2 things that are BASIC to form development are setting a tab order and creating radio button/check boxes where only 1 option can be selected.

I really need to be able to set the tab order properly, my client is demanding the form be done in Word (which I am opposed to doing) and they will not accept the tab order being so far out of whack. Is there anyone who can help me to fix this?

See How to set the "tab order" of a Word Form by Dave Rado, MVP and Mark Tangard

Thanks, I'm familiar with that link, but unfortunately, that is not an option - I cannot use Macros in this form, and the issues that apply to the macro method are not acceptable even if I was able to use them.

I have found that the tab order seems to match the order of the Bookmarks when ordered by 'Location'. Unfortunately, there is no way to change the order of the bookmarks that I have found. I'm going to have to see if I can try editing the document's XML to see if that will re-order the bookmarks. I tried deleting all bookmarks and re-creating them, but they revert to the order that I currently am stuck with.

This is why I hate working with Microsoft products.

After lots of trial and error, and copying and pasting, I have finally gotten the tab order to work the way it is supposed to. I moved the project to my older PC which has Office 2003 (although I don't think the version had any impact on the resolution of the issue). I was finally able to get the text fields working by cutting one frame, setting the cursor in the frame of the next field, then pasting. The checkboxes didn't seem to work with the rest of the fields, so I had to go back and reset them similarly afterwards, and some combination of having the correct frame selected when pasting seems to have finally paid off. This is totally ludicrous that I had to go to these measures to set a simple tab order. I only hope that the order stays put as I make the rest of the changes that are coming my way fom the client.

Without going into all the details, Word indexes shapes according to the order in which they're inserted and this is what controls your 'tab order'. This order can be manipulated by vba (and the macro wouldn't have to be in the target document).

A simpler solution would have been to overlay the the graphic with a floating table, whose cells are sized such that the formfields end up where you want them. The formfield order would then progress logically from left to right, moving to the next table row as you tab out of each formfield.

__________________
Cheers,
Paul Edstein
[Fmr MS MVP - Word]