IBM® FileNet® eForms for P8 is installed on the Application Engine or Workplace XT server, and form solutions are configured using the Workplace or Workplace XT applications' administrative wizards. Users interact with eForms documents that reside in an object store directly from within their application or through links on a custom web application that point to them using a URL to the application server.
The following diagram illustrates a Windows-based client that uses the eForms Designer application to design and deploy form templates, a client browser acting as a solution designer configuring a solution, and a client browser acting as a form user. Most communications are with Application Engine or Workplace XT, which in turn communicate with Content Platform Engine, customer databases, and print services (for forms rendering capability).
A form template author uses eForms Designer, a powerful forms design application that runs on the client desktop, to design and store form templates. The tool has a direct connection through Application Integration to an object store to allow easy storage and retrieval of form templates. The form template author typically associates a form template with a form policy. (If a form template is not associated with a form policy, a user can open a form based on that template, but cannot enter data into the form.)
A solution author (who can be the same person as the forms template author) creates workflows, entry templates, and form policy documents that together define how a form behaves when filled out. Using the Form Policy Authoring wizards in Workplace, the solution author performs such tasks as associating a workflow with a form, configuring form fields to map to workflow data or to document properties, and so on. The resulting form policy document is then saved to the object store and is subsequently used when a user wants to create a form.
A user can click a link to a form policy to begin completing a new form, or a new or partially completed form can be displayed as the interface to a workflow step (when the user clicks a work item from a work queue, for instance). eForms retrieves the information from the form policy document, the form template, and any workflow data and renders them into an intelligent HTML-based form that appears in the user's web browser. No desktop applications or browser downloads are required.
While completing a form, a user can enter values that trigger data lookups to other corporate databases, resulting in form fields being completed automatically. Users can also be given the option to generate a high-quality PDF version of their completed form that can be printed or saved. This feature uses the eForms Print Services, a component that, in addition to generating PDF documents, can be called programmatically to generate TIFF versions that can be used as part of an archival process. eForms Print Services runs in a Microsoft .NET-connected environment and is typically installed on the content platform engine, although it can be installed on a separate Windows-based server running IIS and the .NET framework.
Form data documents, produced as a result of completing and saving a form, are also stored and versioned in an object store using the settings specified in the Form Data Entry Template associated with the form's policy.