Every field has properties you can change after it is drawn: its name, what it looks like and how it behaves.
Steps
- In the rail, choose Forms, then open the Fields list and click a field. It is outlined on the page.
- Press Ctrl and click to add another field, or Shift and click to take a run of fields. Esc, or a click on empty page, selects nothing.
- Open the Properties tab. It shows the first field you selected, and every change you make applies to all the fields selected.
- Change what you need. Each box takes effect when you leave it, and each change is one step you can undo.
What you can change
- Name (one field at a time), Tooltip, Required and Read only. A dot in a name makes a group, so renaming "a.b" to "c.b" moves the field under the group "c", which is made if the form has none. A group left empty is taken away, and a calculation Monstera wrote that adds the field up follows its new name. A name another field already has, or runs through, is said in the name box and not sent.
- Default value for a text field, dropdown or list box.
- Font, Size (0 is automatic), Text colour, Border colour, Border width and Fill colour. Choose None to take a border or fill colour away.
- A text field or a dropdown can use any font in the list, from this computer, from Monstera or already in the document: Monstera draws what the field shows in it, and it stays in that font when the field is filled, printed or flattened. Another app that redraws the field while someone types in it uses Helvetica, Times or Courier, whichever is closest. A list box, a tick box and a radio button use Helvetica, Times or Courier.
- Border style for a text field, a dropdown, a tick box or a radio button: solid, dashed, bevelled, inset or underline. A list box and a button keep a solid border.
- Check style for a tick box or a radio button: a check, a circle, a cross, a diamond, a square or a star. It applies to every option of a radio group.
- Validate for a text field: the least and the most number it takes. Leave one empty for no limit on that side. When someone fills the field with a number outside it, Monstera says so and keeps what they typed.
- Several lines, Check spelling for a text field; Allow typing for a dropdown; Allow several for a list box.
- Choices for a dropdown, a list box or a radio group, one row each. Add a choice adds one, Sort A to Z sorts them, and each row has buttons to move it up or down and to remove it. For a radio group these are the values of its options in the order they sit.
- Beside each choice of a dropdown or a list box, what the document stores for it, when that is something other than the text people read. Leave it empty to keep the choice itself. Changing a choice's text keeps what is stored for it.
- Format: a number (decimal places, separators, negative numbers and a currency sign), a percentage, a date or a time.
- Calculation: the sum, product, average, smallest or largest of other fields you name, and where it falls in the calculation order.
- Actions for a button, one button at a time. Choose Add action, then When it runs (pressed and let go, pressed down, the pointer moving onto it or off it) and what it does under Do: Go to a page, at the zoom in use, the whole page or the page width; Open a web link, a whole address starting with https://, which Monstera asks about before opening it; Reset the form, every field or only the fields you tick; Show or hide fields, the fields you tick, hidden or shown again (a hidden field cannot be filled until it is shown); Print the document, which opens the Print window, so nothing is printed until Print is chosen there; or Import form data, which asks you to choose an FDF file, as Import form data does from the ribbon. The file name it holds is for other PDF readers, which look for that file beside the document; Monstera never opens it by itself; or Submit the form, which sends the fields you choose, as FDF, XFDF or web form data, to an address starting with https:// or to an email address. Pressing the button asks first, naming the address and the fields. An email address opens your mail app with the form in a new message, and nothing is sent until you send it there; if the form is too long for a message, the mail app opens an empty one and Monstera offers to save the form data so you can attach it; or Open a file, a PDF in the same folder as the document, which Monstera asks about and then opens in a new tab. Monstera opens only a PDF and never starts a program. Save action adds it. Each action has buttons to edit it, move it up or down and remove it, and a button runs its actions in that order when it is used while the form is filled in.
- A button holding a script, or another action Monstera never runs, is kept exactly as it is: its actions are listed and not changed here.
Line up and copy
- With two or more fields selected, the foot of the Properties tab offers Align left edges, Align right edges, Align tops, Align bottoms, Centre across the first field and Centre down the first field, and also Same width as the first field, Same height as the first field and Same size as the first field. Fields already where you ask are left alone.
- With one field selected, Copy to other pages… puts a copy at the same place on the pages you type. On a page of another size the place is the same fraction of the page, and the copy is kept inside it. Each copy is a new field with its own name and starts empty. A radio option and a signature cannot be copied alone.
- In the Forms section, Tab order… chooses how the Tab key moves through the form: across each row, down each column, or in the order the document was made, on every page. Or choose In the order I click: each field shows its number, click the fields one after another, and choose Set this order. Click a field again to take it out, or press Esc to stop without changing anything.
Good to know
- Formats and calculations are written the way other PDF programs write them, so they work there too. Monstera works them out itself and never runs a script from a document. A script it did not write is kept as it is and the pane says so.
- A name another field holds is said in the name box and not sent.
- Fields in an encrypted document cannot be changed, and Monstera says so.
- Undo any of it with Ctrl+Z.
This is the article from Monstera's built-in Help centre. In the app, press F1 to open the article for where you are. All help articles