People have been automating documents since the 1990s, but today, the process has reached a fever pitch to the extent everyone needs to know the what and how of document automation. Many people associate automation with robots performing mechanical tasks but, in this case, it is more of software and templates following defined processes to generate documents.
Document automation lets you transform structured and repetitive documents into smart templates that will be used in the process of creating error-free documents according to set guidelines and format. Document automation lets you use parts of pre-existing data or information and even include new data to assemble, create, or generate a document using logic-based flow.
Without document automation software, you would be wasting thousands of hours (yearly) creating repetitive, boring documents with little changes. Whether you’re in the financial, legal, sales, healthcare, pharma, HR, or other industries you can use this software to automate documents in just a few clicks. So, you can close more sales and get approved for new proposals in just a few minutes.
Templates are like an ice tray and documents are the ice cubes. If the tray is triangular, the ice will be shaped the same way. The document automation Word solution makes it easy when creating a particular document in the familiar Microsoft Word. Usually, expert knowledge is used to create the template. For example, if you wish to make a contract template, then a lawyer would help in the process to ensure it meets the strict standards of the legal profession. But, no more when you have the software to do the job for you. You can integrate it into your everyday work applications like Salesforce, MS Dynamics and more to generate and save documents right there.
Software is what adds intelligence to the template and the final document. It will follow the guidelines needed to populate the template and prompt the user to answer certain queries necessary to fill dynamic sections of the document.
The better the software, the better the automation process. This is why many users will carry out document automation software comparison to find which software will suit their needs best. There are a lot of factors that go into the comparison of the software. Not all of them are created equal and so users need to be careful when making a choice.
Several industries as indicated above -- banking, finance, pharma, legal, etc. utilize document automation software to improve the creation of documents and adhere to regulatory guidelines. For example, healthcare records are automated for quicker service delivery while finance can avoid costly errors associated with manual data entry in their statements.
When an industry has documents that are repeatedly created, automating documents can be an efficient way to generate them.
The impact of COVID-19 is putting pressure on health practitioners to find efficient ways of documenting their processes as they work fast to bring life-saving drugs and vaccines to the market. The entire medical field is resorting to technology for various document generation needs.
Document automation frees the scientists and researchers from the task of data entry which is important when generating different research findings as well as reporting a shortage of drugs or handling patient’s records.
On the other hand, as the culture of remote working skyrocketed due to the pandemic, even individual employees with little to no knowledge of programming can automate their documents in just a few clicks.
Document automation enables users to generate several documents quickly and accurately. Enterprises with a high document output demand appreciate that they can create thousands of documents and the output is not limited to a single format.
You can choose from different common formats like PDF, HTML,DOCX, and so many more.
A lot depends on the features of the software but the main trait of the best document automation software is that it should make your job and workflow easier to create multiple customized documents from a single template or use multiple templates (as sub-templates) to create a single document and simplify the process. Know about any possible vulnerabilities and security cracks in the software before you download it.
Organizations that look to serve their customers efficiently trust Windward to produce quality documents all the time. Over 2000 clients rely on our software everyday to create hundreds of thousands of documents. It is easy to use and documents look professional. Users can be sure that all the necessary data will be captured and used in generating documents in a fraction of the time it would take using other options. When you compare the cost with performance, it is indeed total value for money.
Know how the World’s #1 document automation software simplifies and speeds up your everyday process.
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Adds various capabilities such as inequalities,descending sort, joins, and other functions.
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SQL Select Debugger
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Added a Query tab as a field for typing or pasting in a select statement
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All tags using that Data source will be automatically updated with that name.
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New single interface to replace 2 separate dialog boxes
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Displays of all the tags in the template, structured as they are placed in the template. This provides a simple & intuitive way to see the structure of your template. Also provides the capability to go to any tag and/or see the properties of any tag.
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The ability to integrate the Windward Engine into Google’s cloud computing platform for developing and hosting web applications dubbed Google Applications Engine (GAE).
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If you've just discovered us, we're excited. Learn more about Windward document automation software now.
Try Windward with our 30-day free trial and start creating documents in quick time with our low/no code solutions.
This new integration will allow for processing of complex scripts and bi-directional text such as Arabic. Your PDF output will be much tighter and more closely match your template, and we’ll be able to respond rapidly to PDF requests and fixes.
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Includes support for new ForEach and slide break handling, table header row repeat across slide breaks, and native Microsoft support for charts and images.
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Tags are color coded in the template by type, making it easy to visually identify them.
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Version 13’s core code has been reworked and optimized to offer a reduced memory footprint, faster PDF generation and full documentation of supported features and limitations in the specifications for DOCX, XLSX and PPTX.
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Documents can include advanced Word image properties such as shadows, borders, and styles.
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Windward has updated HTML output to reflect changing HTML standards.
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Windward now works with a slew of new datasources: MongoDB, JSON, Cassandra, OData, Salesforce.com
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The Generate Code tool in the designer allows you to open an existing template and, with a click of a button, automatically create a window with the code needed to run your current template with all data sources and variables. Simply copy this code and paste into your application's code in the appropriate place. You now have Windward integrated into your application.
You only need to do this once. You do not do this for each template. Instead, where it has explicit files for the template and output, change that to parameters you pass to this code. Same for the parameters passed to Windward. This example uses explicit values to show you what to substitute in where.
Any pivot tables in an XLSX template are carried over to the XLSX output. The ranges in the pivot ranges are adjusted to match the generated output. So your final XLSX will have pivot tables set as expected in the generated file.
This makes creating an XLSX workbook with pivot tables trivial.
In an imported sub-template, if its properties for a style (ex. Normal) differ from the parent template's properties for the style, the use in the sub-template can be set to either use the properties in the sub-template, or the properties in the parent.
You set to retain when you don't want the child template's styling to change when imported. You set to use the parent when you want the styling of the imported template to match the styling in the parent.
Any explicit styling is always retained. This only impacts styling set by styles.
Tags can be placed in text boxes. Including linked text boxes. This gives you the ability to set the text in a textbox from your data.
Tags can be placed in shapes & smart art. This gives you the ability to set the text in a shape from your data.
When generating HTML output, the engine can either write bitmaps as distinct files the generate HTML references, or it can embed the images in the HTML providing a single file for the output.
You can place tags in pretty much any part of a template, including in footnotes & endnotes.
Any parts of a DOCX or XLSX (PowerPoint does not support this) file that are locked in the template, will be locked the same in the output.
If a font used in the template does not exist on the server generating a report, the font to substitute can be specified.
In addition, if a glyph to be rendered does not exist in the font specified, you can specify the replacement font. This can be set distinctly for European, Bi-Directional, and Far East fonts.
If you need this - it's essential. And if you don't need it, it's irrelevant.
Windward enables you to build a document by applying multiple datasources to the template simultaneously. When Windward is merging the data into a template, it processes the template by handling each tag in order, and each tag pulls from different datasources. (As opposed to processing all of one datasource, then processing the next.)
This allows the select tag to use data from another datasource in its select. For example, if you are pulling customer information from one data source, you can then pull data from the sales datasource using the customer ID of the customer presently processing to pull the sales information for that customer. If you're interested in patching together your data from multiple datasources, read this post on our blog.
