InfoPath Dev

Hi,

 I have a form that I'm converting from paper.  In the paper world, one of our people completed the first part, sent it to the client, who then signed and faxed it back, and then we completed the remainder.  Since our clients will not have digital signature capability, we have to keep the client's part as is.

Here's what I'm thinking for the new form.  I need someone to tell me if it makes sense/can be done with InfoPath web-enabled forms and Sharepoint:

1. Our rep completes the first part of the web-enable form (call it the Blah Blah form) on our Intranet (No reps have InfoPath).  

2. Rep saves the form to SharePoint, prints out a copy and faxes/e-mails the form to the client, asks client to sign and fax it back.

3. After the client faxes the signed form back to us (the "approval"), the rep saves the "approval" as .TIF image (the only option since we're using RightFax).

4. Rep then retrieves the saved Blah Blah form from SharePoint, attaches the .TIF image as a file.

5. Rep completes the remainder of the form, saves it back to SharePoint.

I guess the big question is:  Once we save an InfoPath web-enable form to SharePoint, can we later open it and still use it as a fillable form or is the data "locked" (read-only)?  I think we would like to make it so that once someone reopens the form, the information they entered initially (before they sent it to the client for approval) becomes "read-only" to preserve data integrity.

The other question is - is there a better way?

 Thanks,

Jim

Hi, and welcome to the forum.

It sounds like you've thought the process out -- and given the limitations (must fax form to client, rep must attach returned fax to form, etc) I think your process looks good.

Forms that have been submitted to SharePoint can be reopened and edited, yes. You might want to add an additional 'helper' field to your form's schema that you can use for the logic to make certain fields read only -- you could add a boolean field called 'IsSubmitted' or somesuch, then, as part of the submit rules, set that field to True. The fields you want read only on subsequent opens could be conditionally formatted to be read only if 'IsSubmitted' equals True.