Who is this article for?

Users of the desktop application interested in correctly working with document population in report templates.

No specific access is required to follow the guidelines described in this article.

Report templates are often automatically populated with audit data on launch. Sometimes this will cause an error or formatting changes. This article describes the issue and how to correctly work with document population.

1. Understanding the Background
2. Ensuring Correct Use of DocPop

1. Understanding the Background

We supply a number of standard report templates that can be populated with audit data when opened. In addition, clients engage us to create custom templates for them, for example where they have additional requirements for data or branding to display.

When opening these templates, the user is able to select to Reserve and Edit and to Populate the document.

When the Populate option is selected:

• The application service retrieves the template from the file store.
• It runs a function we call DocPop
• DocPop reads the required data from the database and replaces relevant placeholders with the current data

The key point is that DocPop should be run only one time against a document. You should not:

• Open a template and Populate
• Save
• Re-open that same document
• Select Populate a second time

When running DocPop against the same document twice, you can experience changes in formatting or even errors, such as Unable to Populate this document, the following error was returned:

2. Ensuring Correct Use of DocPop

When using document population:

1. If you are re-opening a report that has already been populated, ensure that you do not tick the Populate checkbox
2. If you want a fresh set of data, use a fresh template. Either get a fresh copy of the template from the library by navigating to:
   1. Audit
   2. Audit Reports
   3. Add
   4. Add Audit Report
3. Or drag in a blank template and launch and ensure that the Populate option of the file properties is set to a green tick.