GB2114340A - Filling in forms - Google Patents

Abstract

A computer or word processor can be used for filling in forms either by printing data on to pre-printed forms or by printing out the text and data of a form on to blank paper. An image of the form is recalled from the computer's or word processor's memory, the data entry areas being denoted by a searchable character followed by an indication of the nature of the data to be inserted there. The machine is programmed to search for the first such searchable character, and the data nature indication in that area is overtyped, any characters left being deleted or replaced by spaces. The machine then searches for the next occurrence of the searchable character for the data insertion process to be repeated.

Description

SPECIFICATION Filling in forms using a computer or word processor This invention relates to filling in forms using a computer or a word processor.

Form filling is customarily done by so-called "merge" printing, in which separate "documents" are created, one containing the form image, the other containing data to be inserted in areas of the form, the two documents being "merged" at the printing stage. The method can be used for pre-printed forms, in which the text of the form is not printed by the printer, which prints spaces instead of text, or for blank forms, in which both text and data are printed by the printer.

This method has a number of disadvantages. It is not, always for example, clear, unless the operator is familiar with the form, just what data should be inserted in any particular area of the form, nor, always, what space is available for the insertion of the data. Generally speaking, no formatting graphics are allowed inside the variable field when merge printing is used. Also setting-up for a "mergeD print is generally inconvenient and frustratingly so if many different types of form are to be printed consecutively.

The present invention provides a method for filling in forms which overcomes these disadvantages.

The invention comprises a method for operating a computer or word processor to produce a filled-in form from a pre-printed or a blank piece of paper in which an image of the blank form is recalled from memory, said image having areas for data insertion denoted by a searchable character followed by an indication of the nature of the data to be inserted; and the computer or word processor is programmed to search for the first occurrence of the searchable character whereupon is permitted overtyping of the data nature indication and any spaces in the data insertion area with the data to be inserted there, the remainder of the area being deleted or replaced where necessary by spaces, the progam then searching for the next occurrence of the said searchable character to repeat the process for the next and subsequent data inserton areas.

The deletion of the data insertion area, or the replacement of data nature text therein by spaces, may be done automatically.

The image of the form may include the text of the form, the form being subsequently printed on blank paper. Alternatively, the image of the form has spaces or no-print areas (using tabs and returns) in place of text and corresponding in layout to the text of a printed form on which the data is to be inserted by the computer or word processor.

By "searchable character" is meant a character such for example as an asterisk (*) which does not appear in the text except for the purpose of being located by a searching procedure.

If the machine has a "note" facility, by which is meant that a special character is provided which can enclose text which will not then be printed, each data insertion area can be enclosed by note characters, and the machine operated to delete them from a text insertion area where text is actually inserted. An advantage of this is that where data is not to be inserted in a data insertion area, the next area can be located without disturbing the no-data area, the present contents of which (the data type indication) will not print because it is enclosed in the "note" area.

This method for form filling is especially suitable where there is a requirement - as for example in a Patent Agent's office - to fill in a multiplicity of different forms. Since the kind of data required for any area is actually denoted in the area itself on the screeen image of the form, it is not necessary for an operator to be familiar with the form in order to fill it in correctly. Commonly used forms can be printed on pre-printed forms and the form image information kept economically in ready access memory, since it consists essentially of blank areas which can be prescribed by the use of tab and return functions, which take up little space in memory.

Less frequently used forms - and forms of which the format is not standard, for example Patent Agents' Powers of Attorney, which may be standard textually, but vary widely in appearance from Agent to Agent can be held in full text so as to be printed on blank paper when required. This avoids the need to carry stocks of relatively infrequently used forms, and avoids the problem of non-standard formats.

Methods for filling in forms according to the invention will now be described by way of example with reference to the preparation of an Applicaton form - Patent Office Form No. 1/77 - on a Wang System 5 Word Processor.

This word processor is equipped with facilities for searching through a document for a given character or character sequence, and for inserting non-printing notes in a document image. Documents can be archived on to long-term storage diskettes and retrived on to the "working" System Disk for editing. The Glossary feature of this machine is most useful - text and indeed sequences of keyed instructions can be recalled from glossaries on the System Disk by two keystrokes. And text can be Supercopied from one document on the System Disk to another.

In the first example, a form which is textually the same as a blank Form 1/77 is prepared leaving areas for data insertion prescribed by spaces. For present purposes, a space will be denoted by a"." However, the beginning of each data insertion area has an asterisk (*) followed by a verbal indication of the nature of the data to be inserted, thus: *Name, *Address line 1, *Address line 2, *Nationality,... and so on.

The next page of this description is a pre-printed blank Patent Office Form 1/77 and the following page is a version of the front page of the same form prepared on the word processor with the data insertion areas identified by asterisks and the nature of the data to be inserted. It will be noticed that the formats of the two versions are the same, although because the printed version makes use of different type sizes, the textual content of the word processor version has had to be compressed somewhat. (It should be noted that this exercise is for purposes of illustration only - it is understood that the Patent Office would find typed-out forms unacceptable.) REQUEST FOR GRANT OF A PATENT THE GRANT OF A PATENT IS REQUESTED BY THE UNDERSIGNED ON THE BASIS OF THE PRESENT APPLICATION 1 Applicant's or Agent's Reference (Please insert if available) 11 Title of Invention 111 Applicant or Applicants (See note 2) Name (First or only applicant) .......... ................. ........................

Address Nationality ............... .......... ...............................

Name (of second applicant, if more than one) Address Nationality . ........ ............ ........................

IV Inventor (See note 3) (a) The applicant(s) is/are the sole/joint inventor(s) or (b) A statement of Patents Form No. 7/77 is/will be furnished V Authorisation of Agent (See note 4J V1 Address for Service (See note 5) V11 Declaration of Priority (See note 6) Country Filing date File number V111 The Application claims an earlier date under Section 8(3), 12(6)15(4), or 37(4) (See note 7) Earlier application or patent number s and ........................and filing date................... date 1X Check List (To be filled in by applicant or agent) A The application contains the following number B The application as filed is accompanied by:: of sheet(s) 1 Request Sheet(s) 1 Priority document .....................

2 Description ................... ~ Sheet(s) 2 Translation of priority document .........

3 Claim(s) ............~ .. ~ ..... ~ Sheet(s) 3 Request for Search ...................

4 Drawing(s) .................... Sheet(s) 4 Statement of Inventorship and Right to Grant ...................

5 Abstract .................... Sheet(s) 5 Separate Authorisation ofof...............

X It is suggested that Figure No .. . . . . of the drawings (if any) should accompany the abstract when published X1 Signature (See note 8) NOTES: 1 This form, when completed, should be brought or sent to the Patent Office together with the prescribed fee and two copies of the description of the invention.

2 The name,address and nationality of each applicant are to be stated in the spaces provided at 111. Names of natural persons should be indicated in full. Bodies corporate should be designated by their corporate name. If there are more than two applicants the information concerning the third (and further) applicants should be given on a separate sheet.

3 Where the applicant or applicants is/are the sole inventor or the joint inventors, the declaration (a) to that effect at 1V should be completed and the alternative statement (b) deleted. If however this is not the case the declaration (a) should be struck out and a statement will then be required to be filed upon Patents Form No.7/77.

4 If the applicant wished to appoint an agent, his name and address of his place of business shall be indicated in the spaces available at V and V1; such indication will be considered to be an authorisation for the agent to prosecute the application up to grant of a patent and to service any patent so granted.

5 If no authorised agent is appointed an address for service in the United Kingdom to which all documents and notices may be sent must be stated at V1. It is recommended that a telephone number be provided if available.

6 The declaration of priority at V11 should state the date of the previous filing and the country in which it was made and indicate the file number, if available.

7 When an application is made by virtue of section 8(3), 12(6), 15(4), or 37(4) the appropriate section should be identified at V1 11 and the number of the earlier application or any patent granted thereon identified.

8 If the request is signed by an agent, an express authorisation signed by the applicant(s) must be received by the Patent Office before the expiry of 3 months from the filing date.

9 Attention of applicants is drawn to the desirability of avoiding publication of inventions relating to any article, material or device intended or adapted for use in war (Official Secrets Acts, 1911 and 1920). In addition after an application for a patent has been filed at the Patent Office the comptroller will consider whether publication or communication of the invention should be prohibited or restricted under section 22 of the Act and will inform the applicant if such prohibition is necessary.

10 Applicants resident in the United Kingdom are also reminded that, under the provisions of section 23 applications may not be filed abroad without written permission or unless an application has been filed not less than six weeks previously in the United Kingdom for a patent for the same invention and no direction prohibiting publication or communication has been given or any such direction has been received.

REQUEST FOR THE GRANT OF A PATENT THE GRANT OF A PATENT IS REQUESTED BY THE UNDERSIGNED ON THE BASIS OF THE PRESENT APPLICATION I Applicant's or Agent's Reference *REFERENCE II Title of Invention *TITLE *TITLE LINE 2 III Applicant or Applicants Name (first applt) *NAME Address *ADDRESS LINE 1 *ADDRESS LINE 2 Nationality *NATIONALITY Name (second applt) *NAME Address *ADDRESS LINE 1 *ADDRESS LINE 2 Nationality *NATIONALITY IV Inventor (a) Applnt(s) sole/joint inventor(s), or (b) Form 7/77 is/will be furnished V Authorisation of Agent *NAME OF AGENT VI Address for Service *AGENT'S ADDRESS LINE 1 *ADDRESS LINE 2 *ADDRESS LINE 3 *ADDRESS LINE 4 VII Declaration of Priority Country Filing date File number *COUNTRY *DATE *NUMBER *COUNTRY *DATE *NUMBER *COUNTRY *DATE *NUMBER *COUNTRY *DATE *NUMBER VIII The Application claims an earlier date under Section 8(3), 12(6), 15(4) or 37(4) Earlier appln or pat no. *NUMBER filing date *DATE This prepared form is archived as a separate document that can be recalled from archive diskette whenever needed. However, since this is a form which is frequently used, it would also be useful to have it as a glossary document which is kept permanently on the System Disk so that it can be recalled by attaching the glossary to the work station and depressing the assigned glossary key.

When as a result the form image is displayed on the screeen the instruction "SEARCH *D can be given by the appropriate keystrokes after the cursor has been returned to the top of the screen by the "NORTH" instruction. The cursor now moves to the first asterisk, which is followed by the word "REFERENCE".

Supposing the reference is (as it actually is in this case) M81/021 9/GB. This is then overtyped, beginning at the asterisk. The image at this point shows M81/0219/GB . Since only spaces are left in this area, nothing further needs to be done here.

The instruction SEARCH * is now given again and the cursor moves to the asterisk at the start of the next data insertion area, where the title of the invention is now printed over. This process is repeated for each data insertion area.

Occasionally, the data type indication will be longer than the data that is inserted. It is only necessary to print over the remaining letters of the indication with spaces ("-"), and proceed to the next area. This arises particularly in the cases where no data is to be inserted. In the present example, one such area is Section VII of the Form 1/77, where, after the asterisk is located by the SEARCH function, the space bar is held depressed long enough to substitute all the characters in the word "COUNTRY".

The above steps are repeated until all the data insertion areas have been dealt with. It will be seen that the machine automatically stops at and draws attention (because the cursor blinks) to the beginning of each data insertion area and thus it is impossible for the operator to overlook filling in any part of the form. If any part is to be left bank, a positive decision must be taken.

The repitition, in the data insertion areas, of the nature of the data to be inserted may appear to be redundant in this example, because Form 1/77 already has a sufficient indication of the nature of the information required. However, this is not necessarily true of each and every form that may be dealt with, and it is thought preferable to include such repetitious instruction if only to draw attention to the fact that a decision of some sort - either to fill in or to erase - should be taken at every data insertion area.

The next page of this description is an image of the Form 1/77, but with all the text replaced by spaces or non-printing areas using tabs and returns. (The Wang system has a special glossary entry to replace text by space, but it is very slow in operation and suitable only where there is very little text to be replaced - it is usually much quicker to do it manually.) The method prescribing the data insertion areas is different as compared to the previous example.Here, a data insertion area is searched as before using an asterisk as the searchable character, but now the data indication is included between "note" symbols. (Actually, since neither the note symbols nor the text between them would print, the note symbols have been represented by a "#" symbol -the actual symbol on the Wang machine is a double exclamation mark, but in a single character space.) *#Agents reference # *#Title of the invention # *#Title line 2 # *#Name of first applicant *#Address line 1 # *#Address line 2 # *#Nationality # - *#Name of second applicant # *#Address line 1 *#;Address line 2 # *#Nationality # *#Name of agent # *#Agents address line 1 # *#Agents address line 2 # **Address line 3 *#Address line 4 # #Declaration of priority# *#Country # *#Date # *#Number # *#Country # *#Date # *#Number # *#Country # *#Date # *#Number # *#Country # *#Date # *#Number # #Claim to earlier date under 8(3), 12(6); 15(4) or 37(4)# *#Number # **Date # It has been noted above that a sequence of keyed instructions can be 'glossarised' on the Wang machine, which is to say put into a special memory that can be attached to the System Disk and recalled using a glossary keystroke. The form filling routine can be glossarised in this way for this particular embodiment of the invention.

The routine involves the following sequence of steps (the symbols and words in brackets are the Wang codes for the functions): 1. Place the cursor at the top of the page (GO TO PAGE, NORTH) 2. Search for an asterisk (SRCH, *) 3. Permit data entry (N-KEYS) 4. Test if the cursor is positioned on a "note" symbol (#) - if it is, delete it, search for the next asterisk and repeat 5. Test if the cursor is positioned on an asterisk (*) - if it is, delete it, search for the next asterisk and repeat 6. If neither of the above, delete to the next "note" symbol and search for the next asterisk and repeat.

Repetition is done by making two glossary entries, one that effects step 1, and the other that is called by the first glossary, and which calls itself.

The complete glossary document for the Wang machine is reproduced below: (f) (-GO-TO-PAGE-) (-NORTH-) (-GO-TO GL-) F (F) (-SEARCH-) * (-CANCEL-) (-N-KEYS-) (-IF-) "#t" (-DELETE-) (-EXECUTE-) (-GO-TO-GL-) F (-END-) (DELETE) # (-EXECUTE-) (-GO-TO-GL-) F Using a form image as illustrated on page 11 of this description and using the glossary document above set out, which, of course, is used for any form, the procedure is as follows: The glossary document is attached and the glossary entry recalled The cursor having positioned itself under the first asterisk, the data is typed over the data indication.

The EXECUTE key is depressed to step the program If any data area is to be left blank, the EXECUTE key is depressed to delete the asterisk and move on to the the next data area When the form (or the page of a multi-page form) is filled in completely, the CANCEL key is depressed to move out of the glossarised program. However, an "end-of-form" symbol can be placed at the end of the text which, when detected automatically cancels the glossary entry and indicates that the end of the form (or page) has been reached. In addition, prompts, such as "Enter details" can be included in the glossary entry.

It will be appreciated that the insertion of data nature indication is important when the form image is blank for pre-printed forms. Although a data nature indication could be displayed as a prompt, there is not much space for 'prompt' messages, and an abbreviated message may be inadequate in many circumstances.

Moreover, the glossary entry for each form would be more complicated.

CLAIMS (filed 12.1.83) 1. A method for operating a computer or word processor to produce a filled-in form from a pre-printed or a blank piece of paper in which an image of the blank form is recalled from memory said image having areas for data insertion denoted by a searchable character followed by an indication of the nature of the data to be inserted; and the computer or word processor is programmed to search for the first occurrence of the searchable character whereupon is permitted overtyping of the data indication and spaces in the data insertion area with the data to be inserted there, the remainder of the area being automatically deleted or replaced by spaces, the program then searching for the next occurrence of the said searchable character to repeat the process for the next and subsequent data insertion areas.

2. A method according to claim 1, in which the said image of the form includes the text of the form, and the form is subsequently printed on blank paper.

3. A method according to claim 1, in which the said image of the form has spaces or no-print areas in place of the text and corresponding to the text of a printed form on which the data is to be inserted by the computer's or word processor's printer.

**WARNING** end of DESC field may overlap start of CLMS **.

Claims (3)

**WARNING** start of CLMS field may overlap end of DESC **. It has been noted above that a sequence of keyed instructions can be 'glossarised' on the Wang machine, which is to say put into a special memory that can be attached to the System Disk and recalled using a glossary keystroke. The form filling routine can be glossarised in this way for this particular embodiment of the invention. The routine involves the following sequence of steps (the symbols and words in brackets are the Wang codes for the functions):

1. Place the cursor at the top of the page (GO TO PAGE, NORTH)

2. Search for an asterisk (SRCH, *)

3. A method according to claim 1, in which the said image of the form has spaces or no-print areas in place of the text and corresponding to the text of a printed form on which the data is to be inserted by the computer's or word processor's printer.

3. Permit data entry (N-KEYS)

4. Test if the cursor is positioned on a "note" symbol (#) - if it is, delete it, search for the next asterisk and repeat

5. Test if the cursor is positioned on an asterisk (*) - if it is, delete it, search for the next asterisk and repeat

6. If neither of the above, delete to the next "note" symbol and search for the next asterisk and repeat.

Repetition is done by making two glossary entries, one that effects step 1, and the other that is called by the first glossary, and which calls itself.

The complete glossary document for the Wang machine is reproduced below: (f) (-GO-TO-PAGE-) (-NORTH-) (-GO-TO GL-) F (F) (-SEARCH-) * (-CANCEL-) (-N-KEYS-) (-IF-) "#t" (-DELETE-) (-EXECUTE-) (-GO-TO-GL-) F (-END-) (DELETE) # (-EXECUTE-) (-GO-TO-GL-) F Using a form image as illustrated on page 11 of this description and using the glossary document above set out, which, of course, is used for any form, the procedure is as follows: The glossary document is attached and the glossary entry recalled The cursor having positioned itself under the first asterisk, the data is typed over the data indication.

The EXECUTE key is depressed to step the program If any data area is to be left blank, the EXECUTE key is depressed to delete the asterisk and move on to the the next data area When the form (or the page of a multi-page form) is filled in completely, the CANCEL key is depressed to move out of the glossarised program. However, an "end-of-form" symbol can be placed at the end of the text which, when detected automatically cancels the glossary entry and indicates that the end of the form (or page) has been reached. In addition, prompts, such as "Enter details" can be included in the glossary entry.

It will be appreciated that the insertion of data nature indication is important when the form image is blank for pre-printed forms. Although a data nature indication could be displayed as a prompt, there is not much space for 'prompt' messages, and an abbreviated message may be inadequate in many circumstances.

Moreover, the glossary entry for each form would be more complicated.

CLAIMS (filed 12.1.83)

1. A method for operating a computer or word processor to produce a filled-in form from a pre-printed or a blank piece of paper in which an image of the blank form is recalled from memory said image having areas for data insertion denoted by a searchable character followed by an indication of the nature of the data to be inserted; and the computer or word processor is programmed to search for the first occurrence of the searchable character whereupon is permitted overtyping of the data indication and spaces in the data insertion area with the data to be inserted there, the remainder of the area being automatically deleted or replaced by spaces, the program then searching for the next occurrence of the said searchable character to repeat the process for the next and subsequent data insertion areas.

2. A method according to claim 1, in which the said image of the form includes the text of the form, and the form is subsequently printed on blank paper.