You can add hints, help tooltips, or placeholders to form fields. This functionality allows making forms more helpful and informative.

The table below contains descriptions of the available help elements.

ElementDescription
Hint

Appears when you point a cursor to the field title.

Placeholder

A ghost text presented in an input field before you start typing.

Help

Appears when you click on the tooltip near the field title.

General information

  1. You can add help elements of any type from scratch. To do so, navigate to System Settings → Field Tips and fill in the fields as shown below.
  2. You can add help elements of more than one type to the same field. For example, you can add a help tooltip and a placeholder to a field.

Adding a hint

Role required: admin.

To add a hint, complete the steps below:

  1. Open a form containing the field for which you want to add a hint.
  2. Right-click the field title and select Configure field.
  3. Scroll down to the Related Lists area and click on the Field Tips tab.
  4. Fill in the Hint field.
  5. Click Save or Save and Exit to apply changes.

Adding a placeholder

To add a placeholder, complete the steps below:

  1. Open a form containing the field for which you want to add a placeholder.
  2. Right-click the field title and select Configure field.
  3. Scroll down to the Related Lists area and click on the Field Tips tab.
  4. Fill in the Placeholder field.
  5. Click Save or Save and Exit to apply the changes.

You can add a placeholder only to the fields implemented as an input field (text input fields, numeric fields, and so on). It does not work on reference fields, choice lists, or date pickers. See the Column Types article to learn more about column types

Adding a help tooltip

To add a help tooltip, complete the steps below:

  1. Open a form containing the field for which you want to add a help tooltip.
  2. Right-click the field title and select Configure field.
  3. Scroll down to the Related Lists area and click on the Field Tips tab.
  4. Fill in the Help field.
  5. Click Save or Save and Exit to apply the changes.

Form description


FieldMandatoryDescription
TableN

If you need to override a help element inherited from the parent table, specify the table to define a different help element. The specified table has a higher priority.

See the example in the Extension and Overriding section for more clarity.

ColumnY

Specify the field to add a help element to. You can add more than one help element to one column. If you need to add help element to different columns, create separate records for this.

HintN

Specify the hint text. This hint will appear when you point a cursor to a field. This field is of the Translated Text type, so you can type localized messages here.

To learn how to add message translations, refer to the Interface localization article section.

PlaceholderN

Specify the placeholder text. It is displayed in the field before you start typing. This field is of the Translated Text type, so you can type localized messages here.

To learn how to add message translations, refer to the Interface localization article section.

Keep in mind that you can use placeholders for text input fields, including multi-line fields, datetime fields, and numeric fields. BUT you cannot use them with the fields of type Color, Reference, and Choice, unless the choice type is Dropdown without --None-- (specify a default value).

  • Decimal
  • Float
  • Integer
  • Small Integer
  • Big Integer
  • Percent Complete
  • Phone
  • String
  • Text
  • Translated text
  • Journal Input
  • JSON
  • Password
  • Encrypted password
  • Date
  • Time
  • Date/Time
  • Date/Time Specific



HelpN

Specify the help tooltip text. It is displayed within the question icon near the field (see the screenshot above). This field is of the Translated Text type, so you can type localized messages here.

To learn how to add message translations, refer to the Interface localization article section.


Extension and overriding

Help elements can be extended from parent tables if they are extendable (the Is Extendable attribute is enabled). Also, help elements inherited from parent tables can be easily overridden. 

To extend help elements from parent tables, leave the Table field empty. Otherwise, the help elements will not be displayed on the parent and child forms.

If you specify a child table in the Table field, help elements will only appear on the specified form.

Consider an overriding use case:

  1. We create a help tooltip with any text for the State field of the Task table (here, we need to fill in the Help field).

  2. The Task table is parent for other tables like Incidents, Change Requests, so these tables will display the same help tooltip for the State field.

  3. Then we create a help tooltip with any text for the State field of the Incidents table which is a child of the Task table.
  4. The result is that a newly created tooltip for the Incident replaces the tooltip extended from the Task table, and the tooltip created on the Task table remains the same.