A Multi-Action field runs a list of actions, in order, from a single trigger. It has no appearance of its own - it is dropped on the form and never seen by the user - so it can sit anywhere convenient, though keeping all of a form's Multi-Actions together makes them easier to find later.


It is the field that turns a form into something that behaves. A single button click can validate the entries, show a Please Wait, call out to a REST service, put the answer into a field, close a modal window and refresh a search - in that order, stopping partway if a check fails.


Settings

Field Name - The name other fields use to trigger this one. Give it a name that says what it does, because every trigger elsewhere on the form refers to it by name.


Actions - The list of actions to run, in order. Actions can be dragged to reorder them, copied and deleted. Each has its own Execute When condition, so one Multi-Action can take different paths depending on what has been entered, who is filling the form in, or where it is being shown - see Field Conditions.

Three actions are only available inside a Multi-Action, because they only make sense in a sequence: Show/Hide Please Wait, Confirm / Stop Actions, which asks the user to confirm and abandons the rest of the list if they decline, and Validate Fields, which checks the form and stops if something is wrong. A sequence that changes data should normally open with one of the last two.


How it is triggered

There are four ways to set a Multi-Action running, and one field can use more than one of them.


From another field - The usual route. A Button, Button Bar option, Toolbar option, Timer or Date Badge uses the Trigger Multi-Action Field action and names this field. A field's Change, Focus or Blur event can also point at it directly - see the Automation Settings in Common Field Settings.


By value - Setting the Multi-Action field's value to anything that is not blank runs it. That is how a workflow action, or anything else that can set a field, can make a form do something when it opens.


When a field changes - Turn on Watch for Changes and name the fields to watch in E-form Fields to Watch, using {FieldName} notation. Any change to those fields runs the actions. Run When Equals narrows that: leave it blank to run on every change, or enter a value to run only when the watched result equals it - use # for blank and !# for not blank. Check On Form Load also performs the check once as the form loads, rather than only when something changes afterwards. This is the setting behind most reactive behavior on a form: choose a country and the regions load, tick a box and a section appears already filled in.


By hot key - Enter a combination such as ctrl+g or ctrl+shift+w in Hot Key and it runs the actions from anywhere on the form. Useful on forms that are worked through quickly all day; avoid combinations the browser already uses.


Running only in certain circumstances

Fields to Match and Condition hold the whole field back: enter a condition using {FieldName} notation and, if it is not met, none of the actions run. Run When Equals works as above, with # for blank and !# for not blank.


This is a different thing from the per-action Execute When. Use Fields to Match when the entire sequence should be skipped, and Execute When when only certain steps should be.


Points to watch

Actions run in the order they are listed, so put a Validate Fields or a Confirm at the top rather than partway down. A Show/Hide Please Wait needs to be turned off again by a later action in the same list, or the form is left waiting.


A Multi-Action triggered by Watch for Changes can trigger itself if one of its own actions writes to a field it is watching. Keep the watched fields and the fields being set apart.