Abtrac Job/Project Templates aka Proposals, Fee Estimates, and Mail Merge Documents allow you to create templates that contain information from Abtrac such as client, job/project and task details that can be intertwined with other information, such as your proposals or mail merge type documents.

How it works is you create the different report types that you use i.e. proposal, letter of engagement etc., and within those reports, you add different sections with the required information.

Step 1 Creating different template sections

Each template can have up to 20 different templated sections.

To create a section go to

1. 1. Administration ⇒ Settings ⇒ System Settings.
   2. Under Clients and Jobs/Projects select the Job/Project “Document Sections”
      

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   3. Click on the plus at the top to create the different template sections or blocks that sit within your template.

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1. Give the template section a name and give it a section number (the number has to be unique and is required when creating the actual report).
   

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2. You can either copy and paste the content from a Word Document or write it and style it using the design buttons at the top, or using the HTML window at the bottom.
3. To add data-related fields from Abtrac, place your cursor where you want the field to appear and then click on the button on the left-hand side to give you the list of available fields
   

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4.  Once your template sections are created then you can move on to designing the report and using this information.

Step 2 Creating your different report types

To create a report type, navigate to

1. Administration ⇒ Settings ⇒ System Settings.
2. Under Clients and Jobs/Projects select the Default Job Template Button
   

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3. Edit the report name to represent the type of report template you are creating using the pencil on the left and then click on the name of the newly created report to edit the layout.
   

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4. After clicking on the name you’ll see the following screen where you’ll customise your template.
   1. The left-hand side options are items you can place on the screen.
   2. The right-hand side has your data source, and your properties (font sizes, label names etc.) you can apply to the items on the screen
      

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5. To add the template sections you created in the first step of this process drag a rich text box onto the screen from the left-hand side (item shown in blue above).
6. To bind the rich text to your sections, select the rich text and on the right-hand side switch to the properties tab using the “cog wheel” icon and edit the HTML Expression by clicking the ellipsis button to include the section number you set up in the earlier step.
   

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   (This is where the section number comes from in the Step 1 part 4 and why it’s important to be unique)

   

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7. Then you are done with your template.

Step 3 Preview against a job/project

Load any job/project and go to the print section.

Then select the template you want to produce and click print.

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The above template that was created will finally look like this through all the steps.

1. Template sections
2. Report Designer
   

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3. Final look
   

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Abtrac KB# 2110