​​​ 

​​Monday, February 12, 2018

By Jim Hidson ​,

​NO LIMITS TO WHAT YOU CAN ACCOMPLISH WITH SPARK FORMS​

With our SharePoint Web Forms Builder, millions of non-technical users, designers, business users and subject matter experts, without the need for programming knowledge and skills, can now quickly and easily build both on-premise and cloud-based enterprise-class forms and applications by placing a rich set of drag-drop controls in a user-friendly editor and let them configuring the control’s properties, style, validations, rules and formats and then publishing these forms to SharePoint lists/libraries/content types with a click.

SPARK Forms modernize legacy forms by replacing the old one that are not meeting the needs for mobility, performance and maintainability and reduce reliance on expensive developers that require complex tools like Visual Studio.

Lowering your cost while increasing your efficiency is the core of our mission. For that reason, SPARK Forms is easy and affordable to install, run and maintain.

Grow your organization with user-friendly SPARK Forms

BUILD ANY TYPE OF FORM

You can create any kind of interactive form quickly & easily. We provide you with the tools to do that. The types of forms you can create with SPARK Forms are only limited to your imagination.​

​

All the Controls You Need

Add as many controls as you need to your forms, there are no limits to the number of controls you can use on the form. We provide you with all controls to handle your data input and integration. SPARK Forms has the following controls to design an art of design forms: Attachment * Dropdown List * Searchable Lookups * Multiple Choice * Checkbox * Repeater * People Picker * Date * Time * DateTime * Label * Hyperlink * Vertical & Horizontal Lines * Textbox * Multi-line Textbox * Number * Currency * Radio Button * Image * External Data Picker * External Data Dialog * Tab * Buttons * Barcode * E-Signature * Captcha * CheckboxList * Rich Textbox editor (including the ability to add/link audio, video, picture and tables) * Panel (to group controls together and controls the appearance and visibility of the controls it contains) * Page Viewer (allows a view of a page or document to be included within the control) * Advanced Lookup (the most suitable to display data from large lists as the lookup data are not loaded during form load and it allows users to search for the required value using a popup search form) * List Grid View * Toggle Switch.

Responsive Forms .. Build Once, Use Anywhere

Users can work on the forms from anywhere using any device, desktop, mobile device, tablet, they can use any web browser they want as it works on IE, Edge, Chrome, Firefox and safari, also it works on windows and iOS, users will have no worries about compatibility issues, deployment complications or even application maintenance. SPARK Forms automatically adapts the forms according to the types of devices they are using and creates a responsive design on the fly, just create the form one time and it will work on all types of devices without the need to create multi- versions of the same form. All forms controls are automatically optimized on the fly for mobile devices. Users can follow up their tasks and assignments, capture data, submit requests, start/stop processes, complete the tasks and preview contents.

DESIGN Forms That Matches Your Needs

SPARK Forms is the forms builder that enables you to design forms that match your organization’s brand. You can add headers, footers, logos, slogans and even hints or placeholders to guide the user on how to fill out the form. You can validate the data while the user is filling out the form, and prevent submission if an error is found or a required control is missing. You can choose colors, fonts; control sizes, border style, visibility and much more to match your needs. You can create simple forms and apply simple business rules with very little effort, or create complex and logic-driven forms with out-of-the-box SPARK functions, JS, jQuery and CSS. You decide the information your business needs and use the comprehensive tools in SPARK Forms to design and update forms to your exact specifications.

Multi-Views Form

By using "Form Views" you can create easily, quickly and intuitively multi-pages, wizard and multi-tabs forms, you can configure the properties of each view independently, you can provide the users with different ways to view data depending on the type of form that you want to create or the type of user that you are representing the form to. For example, you can break up a long form, such as a lengthy survey, by splitting it into multiple pages that users can navigate through by clicking Next and Back buttons. In addition, you can show different versions of a form to different people based on their role in the organization.

Cascading Filter

SPARK Forms supports cascading filtering for the "Dropdown" and "Lookup" controls. You can select a value from a dropdown list, and then use that value to filter the available options for the next dropdown list. The most common use of this is asking what state you are from, then the next choice is what city you are from, available options are filtered by state, so you only see cities in your state.

Unpublishing Form

Using this feature, user guarantees restoring the list behavior to the default (View, New and Edit Item) templates of SharePoint which they were running before publishing SPARK Forms, and without losing any saved data.

Workflow Integration

​​​​SPARK Forms is tightly integrated with SharePoint Designer, Nintex and K2 Workflows to eliminate the time spent on manual tasks and to automate business processes and deliver rich applications. We embedded the workflow actions in the form to help simplify the workflow actions to be taken from a central point, so you can quickly accept, reject, delegate task, stop/start workflow, view workflow history, view pending tasks, comment on the submitted data and send messages via email to other users within the SharePoint farm.

Barcode

You can quickly and easily add industry-standard barcode to the form being designed through SPARK Forms. The code can be retrieved from or saved to SharePoint text column or can be generated from the default value property or even can be generated randomly by selecting the random option from within the control’s settings.

​Tabs

You can organize your long forms using "Tab" control. Each tab can consist of a certain type of information or a group of controls that displays when the user selects the corresponding tab. By separating the form into multiple tabs, it is not only better organized in terms of information, but also keeps your users more engaged through every step of the form.

Embedding form in a SharePoint pages

To have a full functioning form inside a page and to provide multiple functionalities to your users from a single page, you can now easily embed a form in a SharePoint page using SPARK Forms Web Part.

Drag-Drop with No-Code

With a drag-and-drop, designers can easily design and create effective forms in minutes and for any device without having to write custom code, just click the controls (Text Boxes, Dropdown, Radio Buttons, Images etc.) you want to add and drag them over to your form design area. SPARK Forms gives beginner users the ability to create simple forms, while experienced developers can create any type of complex forms. With "What You See Is What You Get" editor, you can create your forms "look and feel" just the way you want them to be.

Rules Manager

With "Rule Manager", you can create smarter forms by adding dynamic formatting, actions, validations or ready rules (i.e. email validation) which affect the controls within the form that being designed at the runtime. You can show or hide controls or entire sections based on another control(s) or any combination of logic. You can hide/show parts of the form based on specific user responses. When your form has a lot of sections, you don’t want to confuse your users by showing them sections they may not need. You can create rules that make things happen when users enter values. You can create rules that show/hide controls or "Panel: group of controls", change formatting, set control values based on other control, enable and disable controls, make input controls read only, show messages, show/hide the whole forms in a multi-sections form. You can include complex formulas to use in rules and calculated values by utilizing more than 140 out-of-the-box SPARK functions, the rule scripting language depends on JS and JQ along with HTML and CSS codes, also you can use these rules with the "Forms Variables" to change their values depending on conditions, as well, you can specify what action you want these rules to be triggered on such as (onLoad, onSave, onChange or onKeyup).

The "Rule Manager" has an "Assistance Panel" part, which includes the available controls, variables and functions in the form being designed. You can show all rules created on all controls in the form or view them based on every control by simply selecting that control. You can create, disable, enable, duplicate, delete and move the rules up and down based on their priority. You can disable/enable one rule, multiple rules or all rules by a click.

Smart Form Preview

You can preview forms to make sure that everything is working probably before publishing the form officially to the users. You can view how the form would render in a selected device layout without having to exit the form designer. This technique provides the designer with the ability to test the form online and in a private mode before publishing it.

Modify Form’s Source Code

You can edit the form’s source code in a simple way, so the user can add any script references, modify CSS, HTML, JS or JQ to enhance the form’s capabilities. In addition, the source code can be copied from one form to another in order to mimic it on other lists, libraries, content types or even migrating it from the development environment to the production one.

Content Types

SPARK Forms supports multiple content types within a SharePoint list/library by providing the functionality to create a different form for each content type. This means that you can have different looking and functioning forms for each content type.

Version Control

SPARK Forms maintains historic versions, allowing you to rollback to any prior version of the form at any time.

Repeater

This control represents repeating sections containing groups of controls that may need to be duplicated. A typical use is an expenses form where each row is an expense item. You only need to set up the controls once, and you will view them at runtime as one row, which can be replicated when users click "Add Item" icon in the repeater. In each column in the repeater, you can create a summary that performs various functions, such as counting the number of items or calculating the totals of values for each row. You can easily perform actions on the sections, like disabling or hiding the controls within each row.​

With out-of-the-box SPARK functions, you can easily retrieve values from internal and external lists and represents (generates) them into a repeater at runtime. You can add row(s), delete row(s) to/from a repeater, you can show/hide "Add Item", you can show/hide Delete button, you can get number of rows in a repeater and much more. You can create a master-details form by mapping the repeater’s controls to the related list.​

CAML Query Builder

The CAML Query Builder is an intuitive tool that help users/designers creating CAML query in an easy and quick manner. It has features to create, export, copy and test the CAML queries through a visual interface without the need to write any code. User can select columns from "Columns List Pane", user can add unlimited number of "Conditions" to the query as well user can add or delete unlimited numbers of "Order By" clauses to the CAML query.

​​Multi-Lingual Forms

With multilingual feature, you can easily localize your forms for target audiences that vary in culture, region and language. Designers can now design multilingual forms, these forms will be displayed for users depending on their operating systems or browsers preferred languages. SPARK Forms supports all SharePoint supported languages with RTL-LTR directions. Just design the form in the primary language, change the form to the desired new language and updates labels text and control settings accordingly.

Online Help

The Online Help System is designed to help you find what you need quickly. Topics are brief and include references to related topics if you want to learn more. You can access the online help by selecting the help icon from any of the screens within the form design workspace. The online help provide users with all necessary information to help you create forms.​

Attachments

SPARK Forms lets users upload files along with their form submission. With the Attachment control, you can upload any types of files along with their form entries. You can upload multiple files to both lists and libraries, where libraries are not supported by default through SharePoint. as well, you can specify the min and max size and type of files to be attached.

Export/Import Form Design

This feature allows you to export your forms as an *.sff files from the development environment and import them in the production environment in less than a minute. The exported form’s file contains all the form design code, rules, styles, custom JS/JQ code and forms variables. You can use this feature to migrate forms from development server to a production server or to have a backup from the working forms in the production environment in cases they will be needed in a disaster recovery process.

Be More Productive

SPARK Forms provides end-users with the ability to build a very easy-to-support applications that caused headaches for the organization’s IT, SharePoint teams and business owners. With SPARK Forms, the designer can create the form in a matter of hours rather than days, if not weeks. You can quickly apply settings to multiple form's controls with a click, copy/paste/duplicate form’s elements, easily add a new SP column and use it immediately without needs to leave the form, design your forms once for web and mobile, quickly and easily copy form contents to another list’s in the same farm or other SharePoint farms with all its settings and layouts easily and much more.

BE More CREATIVE Using CSS, HTML and JS

The designer will be able to design his form in the way he desires using the available tools in SPARK Forms. If you go beyond the wide range of existing SPARK's Forms controls and tools and want to create your own design and rules, you can do that by using CSS and HTML scripts directly in the form or by referencing them in the form.​

​Electronic Signature

When typically signing a form, you would first need to print the form out, sign it in pen, and then find a way (scanning or faxing) to deliver it where it needs to go. Instead of wasting all that time and paper, electronic signature cut out all the steps in between and allow your users to directly and securely sign your form as they are filling it out online. "Electronic Signature" control is responsive and easy to be used on any device, laptop, tablet, or smart phone.

​Form Variables

This great feature provides the designer with the ability to store data within the form without the need to map/save it in a list column or in a form control. The designer can create different types of form variables such as (Item ID, Integer, Currency, Boolean, String, Date, DateTime, People Picker, Lookup, Radio ​Button, Collection) in order to use them in the suitable context of rules with ability to bind them to controls or even list/library columns.

Auto-Populate

By using Auto-Populate feature, all columns of the corresponding list, library or selected content type will be automatically populated and built instantly in the form design area along with all its default properties and configuration settings. All populated controls will be associated with labels which represents their titles. The designer will be able to continue designing the form as desired easily having all the required controls in the form ready and configured.

CALCULATIONS

Calculations can be used to compute control values based on user input. You can use the operators multiply, divide, plus and minus in your formulas, combined with "OR" and "AND" statements. You can create calculated and concatenated values using "Rule Manager" and assign the result to a Label, TextBox or any suitable controls.

External Lists

With SPARK Forms, you will be able to publish forms on "External Lists", this means that you can design External Lists appearance, add different controls to the form, create rules, add formats, write his/her own codes...etc.

SPARK Forms provides all capabilities and features that make working with external list easier the same way as working with native custom lists.

High Performance

Do not worry about how is complex the form design will be, SPARK Forms provides a solution to design high performance forms, which means whatever the form’s size and complexity would be, it will fully displayed to the users in less than 5 seconds for the very complex form.​

Data Integration ...

SPARK Forms provides the users with all the tools that you need to integrate with Business Connectivity Service BCS, SQL, XML and Web Services to view and update data in a centralized form. Using these tools, users can easily select items from the data source, to which tool is connecting with, and reflects their data on form’s controls. For example, perhaps you are filling out a customer service form, and you’d like to select the customer name directly from external data source (i.e. CRM Database) rather than creating a duplicate list for them in your SharePoint environment and use another data connection to get them to your form, this can be accomplished easily and with no code using SPARK Forms integration controls and special SPARK Forms functions. With SPARK Forms:

• You can utilize the Business Connectivity Services BCS within SharePoint to access external data using "External Data Picker", "External Picker Dialog" controls and special functions.
  
  
• You can integrate the form with an external SQL Database (i.e. SQL Server, Oracle, MySQL) using "SQL Connector" control and special functions without the need to use BCS.
  
  
• You can integrate the form with an external or internal XML data source, XML string stored in SP columns or InfoPath forms by using "XML Connector" control and special functions.
  
  
• You can integrate the form with external Lob applications through their web services by using "Web Connector" control and special functions.