Synchronizing Adaptive Forms with XFA Form Templates synchronizing-adaptive-forms-with-xfa-form-templates

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.

Introduction introduction

You can create an Adaptive Form based on an XFA form template ( *.XDP file). This reuse lets you preserve your investment in existing XFA forms. For information on how to use an XFA form template for creating an adaptive form, Create an Adaptive Form based on a template.

You can reuse fields from the XDP file in your adaptive form. These fields are referred to as binded fields. The properties of the binded fields (such as scripts, labels, and display format) are copied from the XDP file. You can also choose to override the value of some of these properties.

AEM Forms provides a way to help you keep the fields of the adaptive forms synchronized with any changes that are later made to the corresponding fields in the XDP file. This article explains how you can enable this synchronization.

In the AEM Forms authoring environment, you can drag fields from an XFA form (left) to an adaptive form (right)

Prerequisites prerequisites

To use the information in this article, a familiarity with the following areas is recommended:

To use the assets provides for the example in the article, download the sample package as explained in the next section, Sample package.

Sample package sample-package

The article uses an example to demonstrate how to synchronize the adaptive form with an updated XFA form template. The assets used in the example are available in a package, which can be downloaded from the Downloads section in this article.

After uploading the package, you can view these assets in the AEM Forms UI.

Install the package using the package manager: https://<server>:<port>/crx/packmgr/index.jsp

The package contains the following assets:

Add content to adaptive form add-content-to-adaptive-form-br

Detecting changes in XDP file detecting-changes-in-xdp-file

Whenever there is any change in an XDP file or a fragment, the AEM Forms UI flags all adaptive forms that are based on the XDP file or the fragment.

After updating an XDP file, you need to upload it again in the AEM Forms UI for the changes to be flagged.

As an example, let us update the sample-form.xdp file using the following steps:

If an XDP file gets updated, you see an icon in the editor, when you edit the adaptive forms based on the XDP file. This icon indicates that the adaptive form is out of sync with the XDP file. In the following image, see the icon next in the sidebar.

Synchronizing adaptive forms with the latest XDP file synchronizing-adaptive-forms-with-the-latest-xdp-file

When an adaptive form that is out of sync with the XDP file is opened for authoring the next time, the following message is displayed: Schema/Form Template for the Adaptive Form has been updated. Click Here to rebase it with the new version.

Clicking on the message synchronizes the fields in the adaptive form with the corresponding fields in the XDP file.

For the example used in this article, open sample-xfa-af in authoring mode. The message is displayed toward the bottom of the adaptive form.

Updating the properties updating-the-properties

All the properties that were copied from the XDP file to the adaptive form are updated except for the properties that were explicitly overridden in the adaptive form (from the Component Dialog) by the Author. The list of properties that have been updated is available in the server logs.

To update the properties in the example adaptive form, click the link (labeled "Click Here") in the message. The title of TextField1 changes from Text Field to My Text Field.

Adding new fields from XDP file to adaptive form   adding-new-fields-from-xdp-file-to-adaptive-form-nbsp

Any fields that are added later to the original XDP file appear in the Form Hierarchy tab and you can drag those new fields to the adaptive form.

You do not need to click the link in the error message to update the fields in the Form Hierarchy tab.

Deleted fields in XDP file deleted-fields-in-xdp-file

If a field that was earlier copied to an adaptive form is deleted from an XDP file, an error message is displayed in the authoring mode stating that the field doesn’t exist in the XDP file. In such cases, manually delete the field from adaptive form or clear the bindRef property in the component dialog.

The following steps illustrate this use flow for the assets in the example used in this article:

The field that has been deleted is also marked with an icon to indicate an error in the field.

Downloads downloads

Content-package for the example in this article

Get File