Document kinds
Every template has a kind. The kind decides how many copies a client can have, who edits them, and how a document wraps up — submitted, locked, or never finished at all. There are four: Data, Form, Agreement, and Publication.
1. One setting, four behaviors
A template's kind is a template setting, like its name. New templates start as Form — the classic fill-and-submit form — and you can switch the kind later from the template's menu.
The four kinds at a glance:
One shared record per client that you and the client edit together.
A fillable form — create as many copies as needed.
A formal document you edit, then confirm to lock for the record.
One published document all clients view; only you edit it.
2. Data — one record per folder
A Data template keeps exactly one paper per folder — a contact sheet, a case record, a running profile. Open it from a client and Pocper opens that folder's copy, creating it the first time. There is never a second copy to reconcile. Most clients carry the template in a single folder, so in practice that is one record per client; if you repeat the same flow across several folders — one per property, one per case — each folder keeps its own record.
You and the client edit the same record together, and like every Pocper document it saves as you type. A Data paper is never really "done" — it is the page you keep coming back to.
3. Form — as many copies as needed
Form is the default kind and the classic Pocper flow: the client opens a copy, fills it in, and submits. Every fill becomes its own paper under the client, with its own status and history — so one client can have three intake forms or fifty order forms.
Form is what share links were made for: send the link, and each submission files itself as a new paper under the right client. When in doubt, pick Form.
4. Agreement — edit, then lock
An Agreement is a formal document — a contract, a consent record, an engagement letter. Each folder holds at most one, and it never goes through the submit flow. Instead, you edit it until it is final, then confirm it to lock it for the record.
Because an agreement is a document you prepare, clients cannot start one themselves from the client portal.
5. Publication — one document everyone sees
A Publication is content you write once and every client reads — announcements, price lists, house rules. It never becomes a paper: clients see the published document itself, read-only, in their portal.
Only you can edit a publication. All clients share the same document, so republishing your edits updates it for everyone at once.
6. Side by side
| Kind | Copies per folder | Who edits | How it wraps up |
|---|---|---|---|
| Data | One | You and the client | Stays open — an ongoing record |
| Form | As many as needed | The client fills it in; you can edit too | The client submits it |
| Agreement | One | You | You confirm it to lock it |
| Publication | None — everyone views the same document | Only you | Republish to update it |
7. Choosing and changing a kind
Pick the kind when you create a template, or change it later from the template's menu — the template carries the setting.
Changing a template's kind does not rewrite history: every paper keeps the kind it was created with. Submitted forms stay submitted forms even if the template becomes something else.
What's next
Kinds live on templates, so Templates is the natural next read — it covers the template menu where you set and change them.