H-1297-1 Handbook for Section Creating 508 Compliant Documents (P)
3-29
BLM Handbook Rel. No. 1-1766
03/09/2015
HH. Saving as a Template and Create Editable Regions
Templates are a huge time saver, especially if you have repetitious documents that need
to maintain a standard look regardless of who prepares them. There’s no need to reinvent
the wheel every time.
1. Save the document as a template first.
2. Go to the File Tab and Save As, choose Word Template in the drop down and select
the folder location where you want to store your documents. Think about creating a
Template folder. We also suggest adding the word Template to the end of your
document name and keep an original separate, especially if you will be adding a
password to protect the template document from being edited. If you lose the password,
you will not be able to open the document. We suggest you keep your original unlocked.
3. If you think some people are still working in older versions of Word you can save it as a
Word 97-2003 Template.
That is how to save a basic template. However, you may want to add content controls or
restrict editing of certain areas. All these can be found on the Developer Tab on the Ribbon
bar.
1. Go to the Developer Tab on the ribbon bar. If you don’t see the Developer Tab, go to
the File Tab, select Options, and under Customize Ribbon check the developer box
on the right panel, and click OK.
2. The Controls Group has several options. The colored double Aa is Rich Text. The
plain double Aa is of course Plain Text. Next to that is the Picture Content control.
There’s a Building Block, a Combo Box, a Dropdown Menu, a Date Picker, a
Checkbox, and a group of legacy tools if you are editing an older document that used
Controls. There is also a Design Mode, a Properties, and Group option.
3. Select the text or images you want to protect or you can add a text control box.
4. Now on the Developer Tab in the Controls Group select the colored double Aa to
add a Rich Text Control. This places a text box on your document – these don’t appear
to cause 508 errors. If you want to add instructions on how to fill out the content of the
text box, select the Text Box and in the Control Group on the ribbon bar select
Design Mode. You should now see new chevron boxes on each side of the text inside
the textbox. Highlight the current text and replace it with whatever you want to say.
Now click the design mode button to unhighlight.
5. If you want the placeholder text to disappear when the user types, click inside the Text
Box, and on the ribbon bar click on the Properties button in the Control Group and
select “Remove content control when contents are edited.” And click OK.
6. To restrict editing to only the areas you want users to be able to change, go to the
Developer Tab on the ribbon bar, and under the Protect Group select Restrict
Editing, which opens a new panel on the right side of the window. By holding our
control key down, we can select individual areas from anywhere on the page.
7. On the right side of our screen Under Step 2 in the restrict formatting panel put a
check in the “Allow only this type of editing in the document,” then choose “No
changes (read only)” in the drop down. Now, under the exceptions, put a check in the
box next to “Everyone.” In step 3 say “yes, start enforcing protection” and add a
password.
8. If you click anywhere on the screen to unselect our items, you’ll see the editable areas