Overview

ShareDo uses Microsoft Word’s Rich Text Content Controls when tagging document templates. These controls, or tags, are displayed like this:

When ShareDo generates a document, if no data matching the tag exists in ShareDo, the tag remains unhydrated, meaning it keeps its placeholder text and style rather than being replaced with live data. By default, unhydrated tags show the ShareDo tag and placeholder text in dark grey on a white background.

To help users quickly see when a tag has not been populated with data, a Template Administrator can change the placeholder text and apply a more noticeable style in the template document.

Configuring how placeholder text appears

Setting the Placeholder Text

To set the default text of the unhydrated tag, open the document template and click in the tag frame. Then type in your new placeholder text.

This changes only the placeholder content. The tag remains intact, and the original tag name will still show in the tag’s frame and the Document Browser.

If the tag stays unhydrated after generation, your new placeholder text will appear in the output.

You can edit the style itself to make the text more prominent.

Changing the text style

By default, Word uses the Placeholder Text style for unhydrated tags. You can modify this style to make unhydrated tags more noticeable in generated documents.

To do this in Word, follow these steps.

1. The Placeholder Style is usually hidden, so in Word, open the Styles Pane.
   
2. Click Options.
3. Change Select Styles to show to All styles, then click Ok.
   
4. Locate Placeholder Text in the list.
   
5. Modify its formatting (for example, change the font, colour, or emphasis).
   
   For example, red text on a yellow background:
   

This change will apply to all ShareDo tags in that template and will appear like this if unhydrated after document generation. 

An example of an unhydrated tag in a generated document, whose placeholder text and style have been changed, may look like this:

When the tag is hydrated, Word removes the Placeholder Text style and applies the document’s default style (such as Normal).

Best Practice

If you have many letter templates, apply the style changes to your Top and Tail or core documents first. Any cloned templates will then inherit the updated placeholder formatting.

See the Document Template Admin category in the Knowledge Base for more articles on Document templates.