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You can use InfoPath forms to efficiently collect data from other people in your team or organization. After collecting the data you need, you can reuse it elsewhere, perhaps by integrating it into an existing business process or by using it in another software program. For example, the staff at a hospital registration desk might use an InfoPath form to collect data from incoming patients. That data can then be routed directly from the form to other places in the hospital and reused by doctors, nurses, and pharmacists.

This article offers ideas and techniques for data reuse. The options available to you depend on the tools, systems, and software used within your organization, as well as the form's overall design.

Highlight data in a form library

You can use Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services form libraries (form library: A folder in which a collection of forms based on the same template is stored and shared. Each form in a form library is associated with user-defined information that is displayed in the content listing for that library.) to store collections of related InfoPath forms. For example, you might create one form library to store expense report forms and another to store travel requests.

When you design your form, you can specify that the data in specific form fields should appear outside the form in form library columns (form library columns: Information from forms displayed in columns in a Windows SharePoint Services form library. For every form in the library, columns display information entered into controls that the form designer designated as form library columns.). This is useful when you want to look at important information in several forms without having to open each form individually. For example, if you store your team's expense reports in a form library, you can automatically create form library columns that show each employee's name and the total expenses claimed. The following illustration shows how this might look in a form library.

To learn how to make form library columns appear on a SharePoint site, see Add, remove, or modify form library columns on a SharePoint site.

Merge data from several forms into a single form

In InfoPath, you can easily consolidate data from many different forms into one form. This is particularly useful when you want users to be able to compare or summarize information from multiple forms. For example, managers might want to merge data from several status report forms into a single summary form for the director of their organization.

By default, the data from a form can be merged into another form of the same type. In the status report example, the manager can create a new status report form and then choose several forms to merge into that form.

When forms are merged, the only parts of the forms that are actually combined are those contained in a repeating table (repeating table: A control on a form that contains other controls in a table format and that repeats as needed. Users can insert multiple rows when filling out the form.) or repeating section (repeating section: A control on a form that contains other controls and that repeats as needed. Users can insert multiple sections when filling out the form.), or those associated with a list control (list control: A control on a form that can be formatted as a bulleted, numbered, or plain list. A user can enter text into a list control, which repeats as needed.) or rich text box.

To learn more about form merging, see Design a form for merging. To learn more about the user experience, see Merge forms.

Analyze data in Microsoft Office Excel

If users want to view the data from one or more forms in a worksheet, they can use the Export to Excel Wizard in InfoPath to send data directly to Microsoft Office Excel 2003, where they can then filter, sort, and analyze the data.

For example, if you collect expense reports from people on your team by using an InfoPath form, you can export certain items from each form, such as employee name, expense, and price, into Excel. After the data is entered into a worksheet, you can examine your team's expenses by category, employee name, or other criteria.

To learn more about exporting form data to Excel, see Tips for getting the most out of Export to Excel and Export a form to Excel.

Share data in a read-only format

To fill out forms, users must have InfoPath installed on their computer. However, in some scenarios, users may want to share a read-only copy of a completed form with someone who doesn't have InfoPath installed. They can do this in one of two ways:

Saving the form as a Web page  With the Export to Web feature, users can save their form as a Single File Web Page (MHTML) (Single File Web Page (MHTML): An HTML document saved in MHTML format, which integrates inline graphics, applets, linked documents, and other supporting items referenced in the document.). This file type allows people to view (but not modify) the contents of the form in Microsoft Internet Explorer.

Sending the form in an e-mail message  Users who have Microsoft Office Outlook 2003 installed can click the Send to Mail Recipient command to send their form in the body of an e-mail message.

To learn more about sharing forms, see Sharing InfoPath forms with users who do not have InfoPath.

Submit data to another location

By default, users decide where to store an InfoPath form by clicking Save or Save As on the File menu. If you want users to send form data to a specific location instead, you can enable submit options for the form. When you do this, InfoPath adds a Submit command to the File menu and, in some cases, a Submit button to the Standard toolbar. You can also add a custom Submit button directly on the form, or disable certain commands, such as the Save and Save As commands, when form submission is activated.

You can design your form so that data is submitted to the locations outlined in the following table.

You can also submit a form to a Web server by using HTTP, or write managed code or script to create advanced functionality for submitting forms. For more information about submitting forms and customizing form submission options, see An introduction to submitting InfoPath forms.

Integrate data into an existing business process

More and more, companies are using Extensible Markup Language (XML) (Extensible Markup Language (XML): A condensed form of Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML) that enables developers to create customized tags that offer flexibility in organizing and presenting information.) to standardize, exchange, and manage business information. When users fill out forms in InfoPath, the data inside those forms is saved or submitted as industry-standard XML. This makes it easy for organizations to reuse data from forms in existing XML-based business systems or in other software programs that work with and understand XML.

Because XML is a standardized file format, the data stored in an InfoPath form can be shared with any existing process that uses an XML Schema (XML Schema: A formal specification, written in XML, that defines the structure of an XML document, including element names and rich data types, which elements can appear in combination, and which attributes are available for each element.). A single InfoPath trip report form, for example, can provide XML data to a customer relationship management (CRM) system that uses one schema, a petty cash system that relies on another schema, and a travel planning system that uses yet another schema. The information required by each of these systems can be entered into an InfoPath form and distributed — through a Web service, a Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) call, managed code, or script (script: A type of computer code used to perform tasks on Web pages, such as incrementing a "number of visitors" counter each time there is a new visitor. Web scripts can be written in several script languages. Scripts do not need to be compiled to be run.) — to each of the appropriate systems, without requiring retyping or redundant data entry.

Note  Implementing a sophisticated scenario like this one requires an understanding of how InfoPath works with XML and other developer technologies. For more information, see Getting Help on form development.