About Form Sync utilities

Form Sync utilities help track and manage customized forms and global objects. Each utility operates on a batch of customizations, which you specify by means of filter criteria and manual selection of retrieved objects. You can filter by object type (such as forms, scripts, or validators), by scope type (Site, Group, or User), by scope name (group names and user names), and by object name.

With these utilities, you can:

• Delete customizations from a database.

  You can delete customizations from the Source configuration (only).

• Save lists of customized objects in a database.

  Form Sync generates comma-separated lists of custom objects, which can be imported into spreadsheets. A row shows the object name, type, customization scope, and group or user name associated with a customization. Lists can aid in forming plans to copy or script customized objects. They can also be valuable when you plan to synchronize your database with a new, vendor-supplied version of an application.

• Copy customizations between databases.

  For example, you can copy objects from a test forms database in the Source configuration to a deployed forms database in a Target configuration. For forms, application license records in the Source application database can be copied to the Target application database. Vendor default versions of forms and global objects are unaffected by copying.

• Generate SQL scripts for customizations.

  Scripting customizations is a useful alternative to copying customizations when the Target environment is geographically distant from the Source environment or when the environments are close but cannot be connected due to restrictions. You can generate SQL scripts that contain definitions of objects. The scripts can then be run against a Target database to load the objects into it, without connecting the Source and Target environments.

• Export and/or import data from the Forms database.

  The Export tab options allow you to export forms and objects data (data in the Forms database, that is) to XML files. You can then use the Import tab options to import that data into another Forms database.

• Generate "pseudo code" for custom objects.

  This pseudo code can be useful when comparing different versions of custom objects.

• Generate a "Customer Form License" record for forms that you created and that are not currently licensed.