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Preventing multiple section drag and drop in the Form Designer
Who is this article for?
Who are using Form Designer.
Administrator who has permission to design a form.
The Form Designer now prevents overlapping section actions to protect forms from corruption, particularly when working with forms that contain many fields.
Understanding why this change was made
Previously, the Form Designer allowed several sections to be dragged into a form, or updated from a section template, one after another while earlier actions were still being processed. Because each action changes the structure of the form behind the scenes, these overlapping actions could clash. In some cases, this left the form in an inconsistent state:
- Revise form kept loading, particularly on forms with many fields
- The form was activated successfully but had missing fields in some sections
This update prevents these issues by making you wait for the current action to finish before starting the next one, makes failures visible, and prevents you from working on a form that is already corrupted.
Viewing the preventative message while a section is processing
When you perform any action to the form, the Form Designer shows a message while the section is still being built.
- The message stays visible if the page is refreshed or the same form is opened in a duplicated or new browser tab, so the form cannot be edited while an action is still in progress
- The message disappears automatically once the section has fully loaded
- The same message appears when dragging text, heading, separator, row, section or any type of field bank item or image, in both the section template and the section bank template
When you drag a section into the form:
When you drag a section template into the form:
When you drag a section bank template into the form:
Updating a section to match the latest section template
When a section in a form is updated to match the latest section template, the form now shows a warning bar and masks the form until the update completes. Once you have previewed the changes, click Confirm.
Activating a form while a section is processing
If you click Activate while a section is still being processed (by another user), you are alerted that the form still has an action in progress, so the form is not activated in a half-built state.
Following the step-by-step flow
To work with section actions in the Form Designer:
- Drag a section into the form or update a section to match the latest section template.
- Wait whilst the Form Designer shows a message and prevents further drag, copy or update actions while the section is being built.
- Continue editing the form once the section has fully loaded and the message disappears.
- Activate, revise or use the form as the base for a new form, and raise reports from it.
Note: Wait for the section to finish loading before the next action. The Form Designer no longer accepts a new drag, copy or update action until the previous one has finished. This prevents corrupted forms and failed revisions.
Understanding what did not change
The following are unaffected:
- Unlocking a section - this action is quick and does not make heavy changes to the form, so it does not show the new warning bar and masking
- Existing forms - no changes are needed for forms that are already created, activated or in use
- Raising reports from a form - continues to work as before
- Access permissions - users who can configure forms can see the same message
Comparing behaviour before and after the change
Area | Before | Effective from 57.5.2.0 / 57.5.2.1 |
|---|---|---|
| Dragging a section into a form | You could drag several sections one after another while earlier actions were still processing | A message displays until the section fully loads. It persists after a page refresh or when the form opens in another tab |
| Dragging formatting, field bank items or images into a section template or section bank template | No protection against overlapping actions | The same message is shown until processing is complete |
| Updating a section to match the latest section template | You can start further actions while the update is still running | A warning bar and masking are shown until the update is complete |
| Clicking Activate while a section is still processing | The form could be activated in a half-built state, with missing fields | An alert says the form still has an action in progress. Wait for it to finish, then activate |
| Two users changing the same form at the same time | Overlapping changes can conflict and leave the form inconsistent | The first change is applied. The second user may see a warning (yellow/pink bar) and their change is not applied; they should refresh the page and repeat the action |
| Unlocking a section | Worked as normal. No heavy changes to the form | No change |
| Existing forms and reports | Worked as normal | No change |
Recognising what users will notice
You can only drag one section at a time and need to wait for the message to clear before continuing.
Forms are now protected from corruption caused by overlapping section actions, so Revise form no longer keeps loading and activated forms no longer lose fields for this reason.
This is mainly a protective enhancement. It asks you to wait briefly between section actions, and existing forms, unlocking sections and raising reports are not affected.
Important: When the backend fails to complete the current "Add section" action (for example, you wait 30 minutes and the warning still appears), the form remains locked and shows a message that the previous action is incomplete. You should contact Support so the engineering team can investigate and recover the form.