Wowing with the Document Designer
in progress
J
Jami Morris
Some of these may be repeats but here are some suggestions for the very promising Document Designer:
- Drag and drop fields to desired location
- Option to include title of field when placing on the page layout
- Undo option
- Margins around page breaks are not working
- Set right and left margins
- Allow emojis in text fields
- Ability to mass edit similar element and field settings
- View interactive document within SmartSuite instead of creating a PDF
- Create sections that are collapsible and able to be anchored to each other
- Ability to anchor fields and elements within a section so that the anchor choices are smaller
- Add Headers, Footers, page numbers
- Format text fields as Title, Heading 1, Heading 2, etc
- Ability to add Table of Contents
- Add option for Logo like on forms
- Ability to add a table
- Ability to resize columns in linked record table
- Ability to add grid lines to linked record table
- If table is split between pages, restate the heading columns in the top row of the table on the next page
- Linked record fields split at page break but not Lookup fields
- Linked records should be clickable hyperlinks in doc
- Pageless option
Looking forward to seeing what's released next for this feature!
A
Amanda Peers
Would be great to be able to add images from a lookup field. Right now it just displays the file name.
Would also be nice be create custom sized documents.
Would be great to be able to format linked or lookup fields.
Peter G.
Jami's list is excellent!
Here's my own list at the risk of repeating some of his items:
A Report Builder should INCLUDE, but not necessarily be limited to:
A printable, customizable, banded, multipage document
Report header and footer (that can be justified vertically)
Page header and footer (repeats on all pages)
Multiple optional groupings by field value(s)
Group headers and footers (repeats on all pages where groups apply)
Headers and footers should allow the inclusion of field values, text, page numbers, summary values based upon groups, current date/time display options, embedded images, etc.
Report sections should allow the inclusion of embedded images (e.g. logos) and borders
Font style selection including type, weight, color, size and other attributes should be allowed.
Dynamic calculated values
Linked sub-reports
Columns with optional column balancing
Automatic conversion to PDF format
Option to automatically email PDF to selected recipients
and much more…
Note, I have a RAD tool that I have been using for DECADES that does all this - and always did. SS needs to catch up to the old tools that had or have this kind of capability.
BTW: currently the list option in documents doesn't allow you to control the list's font size. I believe someone said it's set to 16 pts! That makes the list option fairly useless, I'm afraid.
J
James Malin
If this is already stuff that is in process, it would be great to have some additional features added to image/file distribution as well.
In SmartSuite, this would just be basic image manipulation functionality (resize, reposition, aspect ratio) for an uploaded image, rather than just a linked URL (i.e. already hosted somewhere on the web with the exact aspect ratio).
Alex Stoica
Ability to export as a GIF the custom document designer per record.
Our scenario would be to also attach in the email automations a personalised gif with the client name on it and a custom mesage.
Jaya Phillips
yes!!
lorenzo
A key feature I find missing in the document designer is the ability to dynamically display elements based on conditions, possibly on section level. For example, when generating a document from a form submission where certain fields are conditionally revealed based on a checkbox value, I'd prefer to exclude labels with empty values in the final PDF. It would be ideal to (in this specific example) create a section that is only visible if that one checkbox (yes/no field) is checked. Additionally, for the section functionality, having control over whether sections overlap page breaks or remain on the same page would be incredibly useful!
Peter Novosel
Jami,
I wanted to update you on the status of a few of these (really useful!) enhancement requests:
WORK AROUND
* Add option for Logo like on forms - We have added an "Image" page element, that can be specified independently from record data and positioned as you like on the page.
IMPLEMENTED
* Margins around page breaks are not working - The settings configuration screen supports a "Page Break Margin" value that will place space before and after a page break. In my testing it looks like it may be a little finicky with the spacing on the next page, so we'll continue to look into it to see if we can tweak that setting.
* Allow emojis in text fields - You can display emojis that are included in SmartSuite field text, and additionally can paste emojis into text elements. We still need to develop a better UI that would allow you to select a new emoji while editing a text element.
* Ability to resize columns in linked record table - Columns can now be allocated more space by increasing the number displayed to the right of the column name. Space is allocated proportionally, so if you have columns like this:
Column A: 2 <-- Gets half of the horizontal space
Column B: 1 <-- 25% of the space
Column C: 1 <-- Also 25%
We'll continue to update this feature request as we make additional progress here.
Alex Stoica
Peter Novosel Can we also have the option to add GIFs and export as GIF the document designer file?
Jon Darbyshire
in progress
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Sarah Humphries
Jon Darbyshire will this include the ability to upload a logo to the document rather than just entering a URL? Current option of URL doesn't work and have been given no workable solution from support.
Nate Montgomery @ SmartSuite
Merged in a post:
Feedback on Beta Document Designer
J
Jeff Eusebio
Overall, feels like an early build. Glad to have it though! Functional, but rough. Feedback:
1. Allow drag and drop of fields from the left-hand side to exactly where I want them on the sheet.
2. When dragging a variable field, automatically add the field title to the left of the field name. It's easier for me to delete that then add that manually every time, and I think most people would want their fields labeled most of the time.
3. In conjunction with a above, if I could select all fields, drag all to the document, have them all labeled automatically, then move them around, that would save me a ton of time.
4. Then, use an AI to lay out the page in an attractive manner. 😊
5. Allow me to more easily select and change attributes of fields in a group. Currently if I lasso select multiple fields, I can’t change any of their properties.
6. When using shapes, allow bring to front or send to back.
7. Let me click on a label and change the text right there rather than having to change the text in the left hand pane.
8. Need support for Page headers and footers including page numbers
9. Multi-page forms need better support for repeating fields like title.
10. Currently, non-solutions managers have security permissions to update the form. Is this by design?
11. The default save should be back to the record. Right now it's not even possible save the PDF back to the record.
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