Custom Apps

Introduction:

In Zoho People, there are pre-defined forms like Employee, Department, Designation, Leave forms, Training forms, Travel forms etc., to manage employees' information more effectively. Apart from the pre-defined forms, custom forms can also be created to build a module. Once forms are created, you can also set permissions based on roles of employees for these forms. Let us consider the example of an Asset form.

Creating Asset Form:

From your home page, go to Settings (gear icon) > Forms and Services > Forms > Add New Form
Provide Form Name as Asset form and Specify Form Link Name as Asset request details
Under Place it under this tab, select Organization
Check the box if you would like to clone an existing form
Click Enable to enable the auto-numbering and provide Asset as Auto Number name, ZOHOASSET as Prefix and provide number one in Starts from
Click Save

Once you have created the form, you can proceed with the form customization using the Drag & Drop editor on the left-hand side. You can make use of the drop-down field for listing the Assets. For the Approver name, you can drag and drop a lookup field (linking it to the Employee Form) and you can also list the assets as a drop down. You can drag and drop another dropdown field for the type of mobile phone.

You can also configure rule for certain fields to be displayed under a particular condition. Assume that you would like to display the Mobile phone model only if the asset chosen is 'Mobile Phone', then you can set a rule by following the steps given here

Click on the ellipsis icon at the top right corner and select 'Configure Rule'
The first drop-down displays the list of fields,
Select 'Type of Asset', 'Is' under the next drop down and 'Mobile Phone' in the third drop down
Under Perform the following actions, go to Show and select the field 'Mobile Phone model'
Click Save

Now, when an employee adds an Asset request, if he/she selects Mobile Phone under 'Type of Asset', then the field 'Mobile Phone Model' will get displayed.

Permissions:

You can set permissions for actions like viewing and editing a form. You can also set field level permissions. Follow the steps given below to do this.

From your home page, go to Settings > Forms and Services > Forms
Go to the form for which you would like to set permissions
Click on the ellipsis icon and select 'User Access Control'
Select the Role from the drop down and set permissions for View/Edit/Add/Delete
Under 'Field Permissions' you can define view and Edit permissions for various fields of the form

Under View and Edit, you also have the option to control whether the data that is viewed or edited is one's one data or just subordinates' data or Own data plus sub-ordinates' data or All data or no data.

Approvals:

Configuring Approvals is the next important step for the Asset Form.

To configure approval:

From your home page, go to Settings (gear icon) > Approvals > Add Approval
Select Asset form from the drop-down list
Provide Name of the Approval
Click Configure Approver and select the approver-level based on your organization hierarchical structure. For example, if you want the reporting manager of the employee to approve the asset request form, select Reporting To - Single-Level
Click Configure Email Template and provide the required fields
Click Save

Email Alerts:

Apart from setting Approvals, you can also configure email alerts to notify someone when there is an Asset request raised. For eg. when someone raises a request for an asset, you can have an email notification sent to the 'Assets' team to procure the asset. This can be done with the help of workflows. Follow the steps given below to do this.

From your home page, go to Settings > Automation > Workflows > Add Workflow
Select the 'Asset' form under Form Name
Give a name for the workflow
Under 'Trigger Process', select 'Create'
Under 'Action', go to 'Mail Alert' and click on the + icon
Select the 'Asset' form under 'Form Name'
Give a name for the Mail Alert
Under 'To', select 'Asset' from Department List
Give a Subject
Click on 'Create new template' and type the message using the Available Merge Fields
Click Save