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Hello everyone,

I'm encountering an issue with my HTTP request to DocuSign's create envelope function, and I'm unsure if it's by design or if something is broken.

In my development DocuSign account, I have two templates: one for preview with just one 'Viewer' role, and another for e-Signature with a 'Signer' role. Sometimes, users want to preview documents before sending them for eSignature. In such cases, they select the preview option, and I make a call to my first template with the 'Viewer' role, and they receive the envelope in their email to preview it.

Everything works fine up to this point. However, when users open the documents, they don't see any data corresponding to the anchor strings I've configured in the JSON payload for DocuSign. On the other hand, when users actually send the envelope using the second template, they can see the anchor strings properly populated at the desired locations.

So, I'm a little confused. Is it by design that envelopes with 'Viewer' roles can't see anchor string values, or is something wrong with my request? I hope this explanation helps you understand the issue. For reference, I'm sharing my sample request payload below.

 

{
"status": "Sent",
"compositeTemplates":
{
"serverTemplates":
{
"templateId": "f3a2xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx6d6cebf",
"sequence": 1
}
],
"inlineTemplates":
{
"sequence": 1,
"recipients": {
"signers":
{
"email": "Test@abc.com",
"name": "Test Recipient",
"roleName": "Viewer",
"recipientId": "1",
"tabs": {
"textTabs":
{
"anchorString": "<<Project Name>>",
"scaleProperty": "SizeToFit",
"locked": "true",
"value": "Test Project"
},
{
"anchorString": "<<Test>>",
"scaleProperty": "SizeToFit",
"locked": "true",
"value": "Test Comment"
},
{
"anchorString": "<<Test Tag>>",
"scaleProperty": "SizeToFit",
"locked": "true",
"value": "Test Tag Comment"
}

]
}
}
]
}
}
]
}
],
"emailSubject": "Please sign this document"
}

 

The tab data is populated on top of the anchor string regardless of the roleName. So the Viewer role should also work like the Signer role. Therefore, I don't think this issue is caused by the roleName, but more related to the template itself. I don't see any particular problem on your request payload other than the sequence property. If you want to overwrite the inlineTemplate data over the serverTemplate, please set the sequence property of the serverTemplate as 1 and 2 for the inlineTemplate's sequence property. Please refer to the "Sequence and adding non-document attributes to your envelope" section on this page for more information: https://developers.docusign.com/docs/esign-rest-api/esign101/concepts/templates/composite/

So my question is, does the document in the template include the anchor string <<Project Name>>, <<Test>>, and <<Test Tag>>?

If the anchor string exist in the document of the template but you still see the issue, I suggest initiating a support case with Docusign as it is much easier and faster to investigate this issue with your envelope ID, template ID, integration key, and account ID. Here's the link to open the support case with DocuSign: https://support.docusign.com/s/articles/How-Do-I-Open-a-Case-in-the-DocuSign-Support-Center?language=en_US 


@vashu

The fields only show up when the recipient is working on or has completed their actions. There is a setting that will always show the value of the fields from the start and I assume it is not active in your account. This is an account wide setting “When an envelope is sent, write the initial value of the field for all recipients”

It is the last entry in the screenshot below. Settings → Sending Settings:

 


Thanks, Michael and Byungjae, for the response. Michael, you are a genius—your suggestion did the trick. Now, after sending my envelope and then exporting my envelope as a zip file in (OneDrive), I can see those fields populated in the respective PDFs. That’s exactly what I was looking for.

 

 


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