HotDocs Tips & Tricks

The ERASE instruction is one of the handier instructions in HotDocs if you are populating data dynamically more than once, or are using ‘temporary dialogs’ during your interviews.  Use of this instruction will completely erase the contents of a variable or dialog, but be warned: it will erase all iterations of that variable or dialog!

Today’s tip is about the DEFAULT and SET instruction models.  Both of these models will allow you to specify that a variable has a certain value, but in different circumstances and with different results.  This article provides the basics on when and how.

Have you ever wished that your CLIENTS could enter their own data.  Sure, you wouldn’t want them to “do their own documents”.  But isn’t it a pain taking hand-written questionnaires filled out by clients, and then having to re-enter that data into your HotDocs template system.  There has to be an easier way.  Why not have a secure “data entry form” on your own website where you can direct your clients to answer the questions.  Such system would notify you when a questionnaire was completed.  You could then “download” their information as a HotDocs answer file and use it for your templates. Such a system is in the “Skunk works” phase at Basha Systems.  If you are interested, please give Rose a call at (914) 827-9173.

The DECREMENT and INCREMENT instructions are relatively new to HotDocs and they serve identical, but reversed purposes.  DECREMENT will reduce a given number variable by one, whereas INCREMENT will increase by one.

The HotDocs DEBUG instruction model is very simple, very powerful and very clear about its use.  DEBUG is used to...well, debug!  If you have templates or computations that are producing unexpected or incorrect output, using the DEBUG instruction may get you back on track just a little quicker.

A very brief HotDocs tip today - the CONCEAL and OMIT instruction models.  These two commands make working with HotDocs dialogs as answer sources a little cleaner and easier for users to work with.

Unfortunately, the CLEAR instruction model doesn’t really have any use on its own.  Its job is simple: to remove all the options and option prompts from the specified multiple choice ("MC") variable.  That’s it.  When used in conjunction with the ADD instruction (which adds options & option prompts to a specified MC variable), you end up with a pair of commands that can dynamically build MC variables on the fly, based on whatever data you desire.

One of the cooler instructions is the ASSEMBLE command, which allows you to queue up a template for assembly in HotDocs.  When it comes to assembling individual documents in packages/batches (as opposed to a template package in a single document output), assemble is the only way to fly.

The ASK instruction does exactly what it appears it will do - forces HotDocs to ASK (present to user) a specific variable or dialog.  ASK is quite often under utilized, as many developers permit HotDocs to generate a template interview.  For those developers in the know, there is a lot more functionality, flexibility and control possible when you write your own interview.  For those developers who design their own interviews, use of the ASK statement is absolutely critical.

The ascend instruction is used with the REPEAT instruction to sort the resulting output.  Here’s what the official HotDocs help file states:

The ASCEND instruction sorts lists of answers (gathered using a REPEAT instruction) in alphanumeric order, from 1 to 9, and from A to Z. The DESCEND instruction sorts lists of answers from 9 to 1, and from Z to A.

There are two major uses for the ASCEND instruction: in a computation and in a template.