InfoPath Forms – An Introduction

You can use InfoPath to design forms and fill them out. Depending on which task you're doing, you deal
with different types of files. For instance, when you design a form, you create a form template (.xsn) file,
which is a single file that contains multiple supporting files. Although it's possible to extract these
supporting files, in typical scenarios this isn't necessary.

Conversely, when you fill out a form, you are actually filling out a form (.xml) file, which is based on a
form template.

This article is intended for form designers. It offers a quick introduction to form templates and the forms
that are based on them. It covers the following subjects:

What you design: the form template

What users fill out: the form

Components of a form template

What you design: the form template

You create form templates in design mode, the InfoPath design environment. A form template is a file
with an .xsn file name extension. The .xsn file defines the data structure, appearance, and behavior of
finished forms (.xml files).

A form template actually consists of several files that have been compressed into one, including one or
more XML Schema (XML Schema: A formal specification, written in XML, that defines the structure of an
XML document, including element names and rich data types, which elements can appear in
combination, and which attributes are available for each element.) files, an XSL Transformation (XSLT)
(XSL Transformation (XSLT): A language that is used to transform XML documents into other types of
documents, such as HTML or XML. It is designed for use as part of XSL.) file for each view (view: A form-
specific display setting that can be saved with a form template and applied to form data when the form
is being filled out. Users can switch between views to choose the amount of data shown in the form.) in
the form, an XML file for the data that appears by default when a form is first opened, script files or
managed code assemblies, and a form definition file (form definition file: An XML file with an .xsf
extension that contains information about all other files and components used within a form, including
user interface customizations, XML Schemas, views, business logic, events, and deployment settings.),
called Manifest.xsf. You'll learn more about these supporting files later in this article. For now, the
important thing to know is that the form template is really a set of related files that define the way a
form looks and acts.

A form template defines a lot of things, including:

 The controls (control: A graphical user interface object, such as a text box, check box, scroll bar,
or command button, that lets users control the program. You use controls to display data or
choices, perform an action, or make the user interface easier to read.), labels, and instructional
text that appear on the form.

 The way that controls behave when users interact with them. For example, you might make a
particular section appear when the user selects a check box and disappear when the user clears
the check box.

 Whether the form has additional views. For example, in an international organization, you might
design different views of your form for different languages. Or you might design a print view
that consolidates data from other views in the form.

 How and where the data in a form is stored. For example, your form might let users submit data
to a database, either directly or through the use of a Web service. Or you might have users save
their form to a particular network server.

 The fonts, colors, and other design elements that are used in the form.

 Whether users can customize the form. For example, you might let users add extra rows to a
repeating table, repeating section, or optional section.

 Whether users are notified when they make mistakes in the form or forget to fill out a required
field.

After you finalize the design of a form template, you make it available to others by publishing it as an
.xsn file. For more information about publishing forms, refer to the links in the See Also section.

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What users fill out: the form

In InfoPath, a form is a file that contains .xml data. Users either save a form as an individual .xml file or
submit the .xml data in the form to a database or other location. To fill out a form, users must have
InfoPath installed on their computers.

As previously mentioned, all InfoPath forms that users fill out are based on a form template, which
determines how the form looks and acts.
To illustrate the relationship between a form template and a form, imagine that you've designed a
status report form template and published it for the people in your department to use. Each status
report that your coworkers fill out is a form. That form is just an .xml file that contains the data (and only
the data) that's been entered into the form. All of the other things that make up the form are provided
by the form template. This means that whenever you open a form in InfoPath, that form must locate
and use the form template in order to function properly. Otherwise, when you opened a form you'd just
be looking at Extensible Markup Language (XML) (Extensible Markup Language (XML): A condensed form
of Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) that enables developers to create customized tags
that offer flexibility in organizing and presenting information.) markup tags and data.

To link a form template and the forms that are based on it, InfoPath includes several lines of code, called
processing instructions (processing instructions: Information stored in the prologue of an XML
document. This information is passed through the XML parser to any application that uses the XML
document.), at the top of each form file. This code links the form file to its associated form template.

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Components of a form template

A form template is a single file that contains multiple supporting form files (form files: A collection of
files that are used to implement an InfoPath form. File types can include .html, .xml, .xsd, .xslt, script,
and other file types that are necessary to support the functionality of the form.), such as files that define
how controls in the form should appear, files for graphics that appear in the form, and programming
files that enable custom behaviors in the form.

A form template might contain some or all of the following files.

File name
File type Description
extension

Form .xsf The file that contains information about how the form is put together,
definition file including the XML Schemas that it uses and the resource files it contains.
InfoPath automatically generates this file when you design a new form
template. As you design and modify the form template, the file is
 automatically updated to reflect your changes.

The file or files that constrain and validate the data in a form. The contents
of XML Schema files — that is, the elements, attributes, and so forth — are
represented by groups (group: An element in the data source that can
contain fields and other groups. Controls that contain other controls, such as
repeating tables and sections, are bound to groups.) and fields (field: An
element or attribute in the data source that can contain data. If the field is
XML Schema .xsd
an element, it can contain attribute fields. Fields store the data that is
entered into controls.) in the Data Source task pane. Each data source (data
source: The collection of fields and groups that define and store the data for
an InfoPath form. Controls in the form are bound to the fields and groups in
the data source.) associated with a form template, including the main data
source, has a corresponding .xsd file.

The XSL Transformation (XSLT) files that are used to present, view, and
transform into HTML the data contained in a form's underlying XML
View .xsl document files. When you work with the different views of a form, you are
actually looking at different HTML representations (or transformations) of
the form data.

The file that contains the data that you want to appear by default in specific
XML template .xml controls. Users see this data when they first open a form and until they
select different values in the controls.

The files that are used to show custom task panes (custom task pane: An
.htm, .gif,
.html file whose content is displayed in a window next to a form. Custom
Presentation .bmp, and
task panes can provide form-specific commands and Help content.) or
others
pictures within the form template.

The files that contain scripts for implementing specific form behavior. These
script files are either Microsoft JScript (JScript: An interpreted, object-based
scripting language that borrows from C, C++, and Java. It is the Microsoft
implementation of the ECMA 262 language specification.) or Microsoft
Business logic .js, .vbs
Visual Basic Scripting Edition (VBScript) (Visual Basic Scripting Edition
(VBScript): A subset of the Microsoft Visual Basic programming system. At
least Microsoft Internet Explorer 3, along with the other Web browsers, can
read VBScript programs that are embedded in HTML pages.) files.

Binary .dll, .exe, The external files that provide programming code and additional business
.cab, and logic. For example, if you create a custom ActiveX control (ActiveX control: A
others custom control. Form designers can add or remove ActiveX controls in the
Controls task pane.) for your form template, you might need a .cab file in
order to automatically install and register that control on your users'
 computers. Binary files are not created in InfoPath, but in programs such as
Microsoft Visual Studio .NET.

In general, you should let InfoPath update the form files automatically, as you add or make changes to
your form template. However, if you're experienced with XML, or if you're an advanced form designer,
you can extract the individual form files and customize them by hand. For example, you might want to
manually modify a set of form files in the following types of situations:

 You want to reuse the form template's .xsd file in another Microsoft Office program. For
example, you can add the InfoPath .xsd file to the Schema Library in Microsoft Office Word
2003. You can then map elements from the InfoPath .xsd file to the content of a document.

 You want to create a toolbar in the form template that contains custom commands in addition
to the built-in commands that come with InfoPath. In order to do this, you need to edit the
form's .xsf file.

 You want to make formatting-related enhancements to your form template that aren't available
in InfoPath, such as adding a background image (.gif file) to a button. In order to do this, you
need to edit the form's .xsl file.

Save a form template's form files to a folder

If you need to modify one of the form files that make up your form template (.xsn file), you can extract
all of the form files to a folder and then customize one or more of the files.

1. In design mode, open the form template whose form files you want to save to a project folder.

2. On the File menu, click Extract Form Files.

3. In the Browse For Folder dialog box, select an existing folder in which to save the form files, or
create a new folder.

InfoPath saves a copy of your .xsn file as a set of files inside the folder. You can tell that you're working
on a copy of the form template and not the original by noting the name in the title bar, which reflects
the name of the folder where you saved the files. From this point on, any changes that you make in
InfoPath apply only to the files in the folder, and not to your original .xsn file. This helps prevent you
from accidentally overwriting your original form template with unintended changes. To apply changes to
the original .xsn file, you must combine the files back into a single .xsn file, and then overwrite the
original file.

4. Edit the files in Microsoft Notepad or in another text-editing program.

Combine a set of form files into a single .xsn file

After you make changes to one or more form files, you typically combine them back into a single .xsn
file.
 1. In Microsoft Windows Explorer, right-click Manifest.xsf, and then click Design on the shortcut
menu.

The form opens in InfoPath design mode.

 Note   If you get an error message that prevents you from opening the file, review the changes that you
made. If you modified an XML file, such as the .xsf file, make sure that there are no errors in the code. In
the unlikely case that you can't fix the problem, you can always revert to your original .xsn file.

2. Test your form thoroughly to make sure that it still works as expected.

3. To overwrite your original .xsn file with the new changes, do one of the following:

 To publish your form, click Publish on the File menu, and then follow the steps in the
Publishing Wizard. When prompted, choose to overwrite the original form template.

 To continue designing your original form, click Save As on the File menu. If prompted to
save or publish, click Save. In the Save As dialog box, locate the original .xsn file, and
then click Save. Note that from this point on, clicking Save updates the original .xsn file,
not the files in the folder.

 Note   In certain situations, you may decide not to combine the files that you extracted. For example,
some form designers want to integrate the entire set of files into a source control system such as
Microsoft Visual SourceSafe. They can then run a difference-reporting tool that detects and reconciles
differences across versions of the same file, which helps when multiple developers are working on the
same form. This type of difference-reporting isn't possible with the .xsn file type.

Get XSD for a form

 In InfoPath, create a form template or use an existing one. Here we will make use of one of the
sample form templates that comes with InfoPath, the Sample - Expense Report form template.

 On the File menu, click Save As Source Files and save the form files in a folder on your local computer.
There will be a file called myschema.xsd among the files you just saved.