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About conditional formatting

Conditional formatting allows you to change the appearance of a control based on values users enter into your Microsoft Office InfoPath 2003 form. You can set conditions that determine the formatting for each control, such as font style, text color, and background color. You can also hide or disable a control. Controls can have multiple conditions, which means that a control’s appearance can change in different ways depending on the values entered into it. A control's appearance can also change based on the values entered into other controls on the form, or on whether the data in a control has been digitally signed.

You can use conditions to determine whether the value of a control is blank, is within a specified range, equals the value of another control, or starts with or contains certain characters. You can then associate formatting with that condition to highlight important data and provide a more interactive experience for users when they fill out the form. For example, conditional formatting can be set to:

• Hide a control unless a specific check box is selected.
• Disable a Look Up button unless the user enters a name into a specific text box.
• Make a text box read-only unless a specific value is entered into another text box.
• Change the font color and style for all expenses that require a receipt.
• Change row colors in a repeating table based on the value of a text box in the table.
• Mark financial entries with red text when they are below zero, and green text when they are equal to or higher than zero.

Tip

Note  The information in this topic may not apply if you are working with a form designed using Microsoft Office InfoPath 2003 without the service pack installed. Learn more