How can I have a form field's input appear in the footer?

[LibreNewbie3]

Hello all -

I’d like to know how I can have a form field’s input (like say, the field is “ID” and then the person types in their ID number) appear automatically in the footer?

I want the ID number the person enters to appear at the bottom of every page onwards to the end.

many thanks!

[hill_hobbit]

This may not be the best answer, but I would do this by making a document property and then referencing the property in the footer using the Fields menu.

1. Make the Property by going to the File->Properties menu and selecting the Custom Properties tab. Add the title of your custom property, ID in your case.
2. Add the Field to the document footer by placing the cursor in the footer area. Go to the Insert->Field->More Fields menu (or use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl-F2). In the Fields panel select the DocInformation tab. There should be a drop-down indicator next to Custom in the Type column.

This will insert the ID on every footer, but will require the user of the document to go to the document properties to indicate their ID.

Hope this helps,

hill_hobbit

[mikekaganski]

1. Insert a Set variable field: Insert→Field→More Fields...(Ctrl+F2) to open Fields dialog; find it on Variables tab. It needs to have Text format if you need to allow text input, otherwise, all your input would be treated as numeric (giving 0 for anything not convertible to numbers)! This step is required to create a variable; after it is created, the field might be removed - because the Set variable field does not provide a convenient UI for setting the value by user.
2. Insert a Input field from the same dialog’s tab. Note that on Functions tab, we have another Input field - which is not suitable here. Select the previously created variable in Select box. Put prompt text to Reference box; after pressing Insert, you will see the window to enter the initial value - provide some placeholder text, so that user sees where to click.
3. Insert Show variable field to your footer. It will show the variable value, which is updated for the following pages every time an Input field (or Set variable) is inserted.