The REQUIRE instruction forces the template user to answer the variable you specify in the dialog before they can move to the next dialog or finish the interview, that is, unless you select Enable Navigation Past Required Variables in the Template Properties dialog box. If you do select that property, your template user must still answer the required question before completing the interview.
The REQUIRE instruction is only available when you are creating a dialog script in the Script tab of the Dialog Editor.
In a dialog, you may have a particular variable that you need the template user to answer before they move on to the next part of the interview. For example, HotDocs might use an answer the template user provides in one dialog to decide what variables it shows on the next dialog.
If you have made a variable "required", in the interview outline, the template user can see that the dialog status icon is red , indicating that the dialog contains a question they must answer before navigating past it in the interview. On the dialog itself, the required variable's prompt (or name, if you haven't provided a prompt) is displayed in red alongside a red asterisk (*) to indicate which variables are required. Once a template user answers the required variable, the prompt reverts to black. Once they answer all required variables on a dialog, the dialog status icon on the interview outline reverts to green.
You can enable a template user to navigate past a required question (but still require the question to be answered before completing the interview) using the Enable navigation past required variables option in the Template Properties Dialog Box's Interview Behavior tab.
To make sure your template users know a variable is required, you can add an explanation to the variable prompt.
| Instruction name | Model | After you drag and drop the model into the script tab: |
| REQUIRE | REQUIRE ⟦VAR⟧ | Replace ⟦VAR⟧ with the variable |
A template author is creating a new template for a legal document. In the first dialog, the template author has added a variable called InitialFilingDate to collect the date when a legal filing was first made. HotDocs needs this date to calculate a deadline for subsequent filings later in the template.
The template author wants to make sure this variable is answered before the template user moves on, so they add the following script to the script tab of the dialog editor:
REQUIRE InitialFilingDate
Now when a template user comes to the first dialog, they will not be able to continue with the interview until they enter the initial filing date (unless you enable a template user to naviagate past required question as mentioned previously).
After you download the example template, you can import the template to any workspace to see this example code in action.