Let Users Retrieve Answers from a Time Matters Record

To link your dialog to a Time Matters answer source, you must be using Time Matters 7.0 or later. Additionally, you must select the Activate Answer Source Integration option when you enable the HotDocs link in Time Matters. (See the Time Matters documentation for complete instructions on enabling this link.)

You can link dialogs in your template to a Time Matters Contacts or Matters record. This allows your users to retrieve information they already know from Time Matters, rather than entering it manually.

To do this, you must first choose whether to link to a Time Matters Contacts record or a Matters record as the answer source. You then must map variables in the dialog to fields in the record. Like most variable mappings, data types must match. For example, you cannot map a Text variable to a date field, and vice versa.

When linking to Time Matters, you can also designate whether the user has write-back capabilities. This means that if the user changes an answer once it has been selected from Time Matters and entered in the interview, HotDocs can either always save the answer back to Time Matters, or it can allow the user to choose whether the answer should be saved back. If changes should never be reflected in the original Time Matters record, you can choose to disallow write-back.

To map variables in a dialog to a Time Matters record

  1. Edit the dialog you want to link to the Time Matters record. (This dialog can be in any template.) (See Edit a Custom Dialog.)
  2. Click the Options tab. The window changes to show several custom options.
  3. Click the Answer source drop-down button and choose Time Matters - Contact or Time Matters - Matter.
  4. Click Map Variables. The HotDocs Variable Mapping dialog box appears. The Variable Name column lists the variables in the current component file.
  5. In the Map To column, click the drop-down button and choose the Time Matters field that corresponds to the variable.
  6. Optionally, click the Write Back drop-down button and choose the option you need:
    • Never keeps the answer from being written back to Time Matters if it is changed.
    • Always always writes the answer back to Time Matters if it is changed. The user will not be notified or prompted of the change.
    • Prompt displays a dialog box that lets the user decide if the changed answer should be written back to Time Matters.
  7. Repeat steps 5 and 6 for each variable you want to map.

Now, when users view this dialog during the interview, a Select button will appear on the dialog. When they click the button, HotDocs will display the Time Matters records list where they can select the specific record and have the appropriate information merged into answer fields in the interview. If users change an answer, the write-back options you selected will take effect when they save the answer file.