About backward compatibility

Microsoft Office InfoPath

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About backward compatibility

In Microsoft Office 2003 Editions Service Pack 1, existing forms function the same way they did in Microsoft Office InfoPath 2003, while taking advantage of the improvements and new features included in the service pack. To ensure compatibility for users of Microsoft Office InfoPath 2003 without Service Pack 1 or later installed, however, certain features are not available to existing forms.

The following sections describe areas of functionality that may be affected when you are working with more than one version of InfoPath.

Show Upgrading existing forms

If you have installed Service Pack 1 or later, you must explicitly add the service pack features to existing forms, in order to take advantage of the updated functionality.

When service pack features are enabled and a user opens an existing form created with InfoPath 2003, the user will be prompted to add service pack features to the form. The user can choose to proceed with the upgrade or add the service pack features later.

To add the service pack features to an existing form:

Open the existing form in design mode.
Select Add Service Pack Features to Form on the Tools menu.

After the service pack features have been added to the form, users of the form must have Microsoft Office 2003 Editions Service Pack 1 or later installed and service pack features enabled in order to use them.

Show Creating new form templates

By default, all new form templates you create contain the updated functionality, if you have installed Service Pack 1 or later and enabled the service pack features. Users of such form templates must have Microsoft Office 2003 Editions Service Pack 1 or later installed and service pack features enabled in order to use them.

New form templates can be created without the service pack features by first disabling the features, as described below in Disabling new features.

Show Removing new features from a form template

To remove service pack features from a form template, you can export a copy of the template that has had the updated functionality added to it. The exported copy has all updated functionality of the service pack removed from it.

To remove the service pack features from a form template:

Open the form template in design mode.
Select Form Options from the Tools menu.
Select Advanced.
Click Export.

Show Disabling new features

You can disable support for new service pack features for all form templates by doing the following:

Select Options from the Tools menu.
In the Options dialog box, select Advanced.
Select Disable Service Pack features.
Click OK.
Restart InfoPath to apply the changes.

You can also disable support in the system registry by setting the data of the registry value, HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\InfoPath\VersionMode, to "1.0".

After service pack features have been disabled, you will no longer be able to open existing form templates that have had the new features added to them, or new form templates that were created while service pack features were enabled. Furthermore, any templates you create subsequently will not have the new features added to them. You will, however, be able to share these form templates with users who do not have the service pack installed, with users who have the service pack installed but disabled, as well as with users who have the service pack installed and enabled.

Show Opening form templates that contain form code with updated object model members

Users who attempt to open forms that contain form code with updated functionality will get an error message if they have disabled the service pack features or have not installed Service Pack 1 or later. For information on object model members supported by Microsoft Office 2003 Editions Service Pack 1 or later, see the InfoPath Object Model Reference. Each topic for an object model member that requires Service Pack 1 or later has the following note in the Remarks section:

Note This object model member is not supported when the Disable Service Pack features option on the Advanced tab of the Options dialog box in InfoPath is selected or when Microsoft Office 2003 Service Pack 1 or later is not installed. Any form that implements this object model member in its code will generate an error message if it is opened in InfoPath when service pack features are disabled or unavailable.

Show Launching and automating InfoPath from another application

When service pack features are disabled in InfoPath, launching InfoPath from another application by using the Application object results in the InfoPath frame being displayed for 30 seconds and then closed. If you must disable service pack features, use the ExternalApplication object instead to implement external automation:

var oXApp = new ActiveXObject("Infopath.ExternalApplication")

Note that the ExternalApplication object has limited support for external automation. See the InfoPath Object Model Reference for more details.

If you would like full access to the InfoPath object model by way of external automation, enable service pack features in InfoPath and use the Application object and its members instead.

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