How do you add a Create Document action to a module? And why would you want to? Learn how to use the Create Document action node to automate document generation.
BRYTER uses a range of actions to automate different aspects of a solution. The Create Document action takes an MS Word template and uses it as the basis of automatic document generation.
Create Document action node
The Create Document action is added below the input nodes that collect the end user input necessary to generate the document. Here is how you proceed:
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Add a New Action and choose Create Document.
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Click the Document template list and upload your template document.
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The template will be scanned for placeholders. TEMPLATE PLACEHOLDERS display. In case a problem with the template document was detected, a hint appears (see Technical specifications below).
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Select Map Values to Placeholders to automatically map placeholders to values in the module.
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For any un-matched placeholders, assign appropriate variables to each placeholder by referencing the corresponding input, value, or action node in the drop-down menu.
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Decide whether you want to output the generated document in .DOCX format or in .PDF format.
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Optionally, you can also enter a file name that is displayed to the end user. If no file name is entered, the file name will be determined from node’s label.
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If the document generated is likely to contain sensitive information, you can make sure it is automatically deleted from the server by toggling on Automatically delete generated document. The document will only be available to the user for 24 hours — they must download it or receive it by email immediately.
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Note that if you change your template document in MS Word, you need to reupload for changes to take effect.
Your next step
Technical specification
Maximum template file size | 10MB |
Supported template file type | .docx |
Supported output file types | .docx, .pdf |
Supported characters in document generation | ASCII and widespread non-ASCII characters like Mandarin, Japanese, Cyrillic, Arabic |
Supported characters in document title | ASCII only |
Excluded template files | Empty files, files without a name, password protected files, files with “track change” mode activated |
Support of MS Word cover pages | No |
Suport of licensed fonts | Support of MS Word cover pages |
Known limitations
- Indented lists are limited to 8 indentation levels.
- Indented lists are currently not working in placeholder paragraphs that have a left indent.
- When using the Create Document action with a PDF file as the output document (rather than a DOCX file), the automatic hyphenation applied in Word will not be displayed in the resulting PDF.
- Similarly, hyphenation will not appear in the document preview, as it also relies on PDF conversion.
Occasionally asked questions
Can I create my own default templates that are available in each document action node?
No, this is currently not available.
One of my generated documents uses Mandarin/Japanese/Cyrillic/Arabic/non-ASCII characters. The document generation is working but the document file name is not displayed correctly. What can I do?
Currently, only ASCII characters can be used for document file names. When sending a document file via email, certain non-ASCII characters may not be supported. Many non-ASCII characters will bereplaced with the corresponding character in the image below. Uppercase characters will be replaced with an uppercase equivalent.
à á â ä ã ç ć č è é ê ë ē ė ę î ï í ī į ì ñ ń ô ö ò ó ō õ ś š û ü ù ú ū ÿ
a a a a a c c c e e e e e e e i i i i i i n n o o o o o o s s u u u u u y