Developers can use the .Net framework to build custom forms or customized portions of a form. Developers (or users) can also opt for non-.Net script language additions, but this will negate some of InfoPath’s display capabilities within the Office environment. It will, however, make an InfoPath form more accessible to non-Microsoft customers via the Web. Users can control all this functionality via built-in versioning, and forms can be output as Excel, Word, or PDF files via free plug-ins.

The Bottom Line InfoPath 2007 and Microsoft Office Forms Server 2007 Microsoft, microsoft.com Good  7.3 criteria score weight Ease-of-use 8 20% Features 8 20% Management 7 15% Scalability 7 20% Security 7 15% Value 6 10% Cost: InfoPath Client: $199 (est) Office Forms Server CAL: $54 (est) Office SharePoint Server 2007: $4,424 (est) Office Forms Server 2007: $4,424 (est) Platforms: Windows Server 2003, Windows XP, Vista Bottom Line: InfoPath 2007 and SharePoint 2007 Enterprise or Forms Server 2007 have enough combined power to truly revolutionize how your company handles forms. From content to display capabilities, the duo handles it all and adds security and business intelligence into the mix to boot About our Reviews and Scoring Methodology

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With more InfoPath experience, advanced users can access tools such as data validation, conditional formatting, the Logic Inspector, and the aforementioned external data sources (see below). Data validation capabilities are the same as those in most other visual display editors, allowing designers to force users to enter specific values in order for the form to save. That includes not leaving certain fields blank or requiring that the data entered into a field comply with a certain format (like dates in mm-dd-yyyy, for example).

Conditional formatting lets designers change the appearance of a form based on program criteria, such as an option chosen in a previous field, the user credentials of the person filling out the form, etc. For instance, if a user were to fill out a form and select his branch office as being in Cleveland, the rest of the form’s fields could suddenly change to match options available only to Cleveland users. Or the form title could suddenly turn purple and a little dinosaur could dance across the screen, but that might be more trouble than it’s worth.

The Logic Inspector is essentially a developer-level form debugging tool. It can test any of the above features and keep the relevant data organized. It’s not, however, for the beginning or even intermediate InfoPath user. 

InfoPath 2007 and SharePoint Server 2007 Forms Basic
Just to be clear, all of the above features are available to users of the InfoPath 2007 Client, with no back-end server requirements whatsoever. Adding Microsoft Office SharePoint 2007 to the mix, however, brings a new bag of benefits packaged as Forms Basics. This amounts to a document library specifically designed to manage InfoPath forms. Creating one is as simple as choosing the Forms Library option in the Libraries menu during creation. Forms Basic brings functions that benefits most users, but the benefits are multiplied for shops making heavier use of InfoPath.

First, security options can be added to a form based on SharePoint’s user security, including individual access, group or departmental access, and versioning. For example, managers can require employees to build work forms, but rest assured that they’ll stay within team access restrictions. 

It’s important to note, however, that Forms Basic only stores and manipulates InfoPath forms for use with the Office 2007 client. Users can make forms part of SharePoint libraries, workflows, and search criteria, but they can only view and manipulate those forms with the actual InfoPath client. InfoPath does support publishing forms to the Web on its own, but that’s outside the scope of Forms Basic; you’re looking at SharePoint 2007 Enterprise or Forms Server 2007 for that.

InfoPath 2007 and Forms Server 2007
This gets a little tricky up front, so it pays to be clear. You won’t buy Forms Server 2007 if you’ve already purchased MOSS (Microsoft Office SharePoint Server) 2007 Enterprise, because the latter contains all the features of the former. Forms Server 2007 is for users of MOSS Standard Edition who need forms processing or simply for heavy users of InfoPath who don’t need the rest of SharePoint at all, because Forms Server is really just another version of SharePoint Server with all the advanced forms processing features turned on.