Authoring tips and limits

Tips for clean output

• Use tables, not text boxes, to put things side by side. Text boxes can move when documents are generated, and a template with text boxes cannot make a PDF.
• Set images to In Line with Text rather than letting them float.
• Set fixed column widths on tables (Table Layout, then AutoFit, then Fixed Column Width). AutoFit to Contents can make columns jump around.
• Accept or reject all tracked changes before saving. Tracked changes can show up as visible text. The add-in warns you if you save with tracked changes.
• Use PNG, JPEG, GIF or BMP pictures if the template must make a PDF. EMF pictures cannot go into a PDF. Word often saves pictures as EMF when you paste from another Office app, and many logos are EMF too. A document can hold up to 50 pictures. See Pictures.
• Keep the file under 10 MB. If it is bigger, compress the pictures (Picture Format, then Compress Pictures).
• Put conditional text inside a sentence where you can, so the sentence still reads naturally when that text is hidden.

What is supported

• Single fields, parent fields (up to five levels) and built-ins.
• Automatic formatting for currency, percent, date, date-time, checkboxes and picklist labels.
• Repeating tables over child relationships, including one level of nested lists.
• Totals: SUM, COUNT, AVG, MIN and MAX over a related list.
• Conditions (if / else) with =, ≠, ordering, contains and NOT; two clauses joined by AND or OR; “show when blank”; and approval history lists.
• Images from a field that holds a Salesforce File, with an optional size.
• Barcodes and QR codes from a field’s value, Code 128 or QR, with an optional size.
• Checking tags, checking the template when you save, Generate from any record as Word or PDF, and new versions of existing templates.
• Converting a Conga template in the open document, under ⚙ Settings, then Experimental. It tells you what it can and cannot convert before it changes anything.

Not in this version

• Excel and PowerPoint. Word only for now.
• More than one level of nesting (a list inside a list inside a list).
• PDF for templates with text boxes, custom fonts, floating images or SmartArt. Fix those in Word first. The save results list them.
• Suggested corrections for a tag that does not match. The pane tells you a tag is unresolved and where it is, but does not guess what you meant.

The pane only offers what your org’s Sliick Docs version supports, so you are never shown options that will not work.