How to Insert Text Form Field in Writer 2013

In Writer 2013, you can add form fields to your word document, and also lock the form to protect other content in the form from deleting or editing.

Insert Text Form Field

Text form field is useful for formal documents which are created for distribution purpose. People who receive this document can easily fill out the form by the suggestions in the text form field. Follow these steps to insert text form field.

Step 1 Open the document you want to insert text form field with Writer 2013.

Step 2 Place the cursor in a desired location in the document, and click on Insert tab. Find Text Form Fieldoption and click on it. In this example, we replace the text of [Street Address] with a text form field.

Figure 1 Insert Text Form Field

Step 3 The text form field is successfully inserted. You will see that the text form field displays as a gray area. Double click on the gray area to bring up Text Form Field Options dialog.

Figure 2 Set Text Form Field Properties

In this dialog, you can set the default text shown in the text form field and its case. This can tell readers what content should be filled in.

Step 4 Press OK. Now do the same with other parts of the document and save it.

Text form field is successfully created.

Note: Add shading to text form field will help readers easily recognize it as a field (see Figure 1).

Protect Text Form Field

To prevent others from editing the form, you can protect the form by locking it.

Step 1 Open the form document with Writer 2013.

Step 2 Go to Insert > Protect Form (see Figure 1). Click on Protect Form to lock the form. Then you will see that only the form fields can be edited. And on the menu bar of Writer, most options are grayed out.

To protect the form fields with a password, please go to Review > Document Protection. Click on Document Protection option and in the dialog that pops up, select Form fields and enter a password. Then press OK to finish.

Figure 3 Protect Form Field with a Password

To remove the password, go to Review and click on Remove Protection, and enter the password to remove it.