Automatic Creation of <<*Ask*>> prompts

Automatic creation of <<*Ask*>> prompts:

At your request, Pathagoras can scan your source document for any <<*Options*>> and <<*Optional*>> text blocks that are present. It can pull the essential elements from each such block and then create a basic <<*Ask*>> prompt for each such block, placing it the top of your document. You can further edit and refine the prompt so that it best meets your needs.

Note: Only <<*Options*>> and <<*Optional*>> text blocks that contain a !group! reference will be processed. You may wish to add a !group! reference to your <<*Options*>> and <<*Optional*>> text blocks to take advantage of this feature. Even if there is only a single member of the group, you may find that the benefits of the <<*Ask*>> prompt are worth the effort to do so.

To create the <<*Ask*>> prompts in this automated fashion:

1.	Make sure that the document to which you want to add <<Ask>> prompts is on screen.

2.	Click the Pathagoras\|Authoring/Editing Tools\|General Editing tools. Under the <<Options/Optional>> tab, click the "<<Ask>> Prompts" button. (Image below.)

When clicked, Pathagoras will scan the document for any <<*Options*>> and <<*Optional*>> text blocks that contain a !group! reference. Pathagoras parses out the administrative content of each one and placed it into an <<*AskOptions*>> or <<*AskOptional*>> block, as appropriate, at the top of the document. An additional 'instruction' block is added containing usage information.

3.	Review the prompts that were created. Modify the questions as appropriate to make the appropriate response as unambiguous as possible.

4.	Save the document.

The <<*AskValue*>> prompt must be manually created, either fully or partially so. See this page of the Manual. If you have structured an <<*Options*>> block in the body of the document that is being scanned which contains ranges of values, Pathagoras will create an <<*AskOptions*>> prompt at the top, with the ranges reflected as the alternative choices. Simply change <<*AskOptions*>> to <<*AskValue*>> and either replace the alternative choices with a simple question or just close the block with a "*".

Clause Sets: If you assemble documents using Clause Sets, and want to use the 'automatic creation' tool discussed, here, we recommend that you perform the following steps:

•	create a 'complete' document which contains all possible options and optional text blocks.

It is not important at this stage that the resulting document contains more text than would ever be used. The idea here is to have a document that contains all of your <<*Options*>> and <<*Optional*>> elements.

Before you create this 'huge' document, you should turn 'off' processing so that the <<*Options/Optional*>>blocks are not automatically processed.)

•	Run the automatic <<Ask>> prompt creator described above.

•	Edit the <<Ask>> prompts to your satisfaction.

•	Copy and paste the entire block of <<Ask>> prompts into the first clause that you use when assembling via Clause Sets. (Typically, the 'first clause' is the same throughout all documents in the topic, but not necessarily.

•	If some <<Ask >> prompts seem inappropriate to a particular Clause Set, just delete it (for example, when a clause set creates a Will for a family with no minor children, delete <<Ask>> prompts referencing a !Guardian!).