How to format text entries?

Open text fields are convenient for capturing data that are not known in advance (e.g. a phone number, an institutional ID etc.). In order to avoid writing complex validation rules, a mask can be defined to format the data when they are entered.

Step 1 - Select Short Answer field

Select the Short answer field type: the Mask setting will match the format of the data to capture. The mask can also be combined with a validation rule (to verify that all characters have been entered for instance).

Note that it is not recommended to use this open text field with a mask to capture date or time values. Use the Date, Date and time or Time specific field types instead.

Step - 2 Set the Mask

A mask is made of tokens, designating what type of character is expected at each position. The possible mask tokens are:

Token

Description

#

Numeric

S

Letter, a to z, case insensitive

N

Alphanumeric, case insensitive for letters

A

Letter, transformed to uppercase

a

Letter, transformed to lowercase

X

Alphanumeric, transformed to uppercase for letters

x

Alphanumeric, transformed to lowercase for letters

Examples

The phone number (514) 286-0768 can be captured by the mask (###) ###-####.

The institutional ID CA32 4455 6E5Z can be captured by the mask AA## #### XXXX.