What are tag delimiters?

Tag delimiters are special characters or symbols that encapsulate placeholders within your template. These placeholders are replaced with actual data during the merging process.

The delimiters help DocuGenerate identify and parse the merge tags accurately, allowing the system to generate customized PDF documents effortlessly.

Commonly used tag delimiters

DocuGenerate supports various merge tag delimiters to accommodate different use cases. The most commonly used merge tag delimiters are:

1. Double Curly Braces - {{}}
   The double curly braces are a widely recognized delimiter used for merge tags in many templating systems. In DocuGenerate, you can enclose your merge tags within double curly braces to indicate the placeholders in your templates.
   In this case, the left delimiter is {{ and the right delimiter is }}.
   Example: {{Customer Name}}

2. Square Brackets []
   Square brackets serve as an alternative merge tag delimiter in DocuGenerate. If your template already uses double curly braces for other purposes or conflicts with the syntax of your template, you can opt for square brackets as merge tag delimiters. In this case, the left delimiter is [ and the right delimiter is ].
   Example: [Product Name]

Automatically detect the delimiters

When creating a template, the tag delimiters are automatically detected by testing commonly used delimiters:

• {{}}
• {}
• [[]]
• []
• «»
• <>
• (())

If you’re using custom delimiters that are not in this list, you can always manually update the delimiters from the template’s settings.

Tips for using tag delimiters

Here are some best practices when using tag delimiters:

• Be Consistent: Use the same delimiter for all tags within a template. This ensures uniformity and minimizes errors during document generation.

• Avoid Ambiguity: Choose delimiters that do not occur in your actual data to avoid any confusion or incorrect replacements.

• Double-Check Your Tags: Before running your document through DocuGenerate, ensure all your tags are correctly delimited. Misplaced or missing delimiters can cause the generation process to fail or produce incorrect documents.

Understanding and using tag delimiters effectively can greatly enhance your experience with DocuGenerate. It allows for automation and customization in document generation, reducing the time and effort required in creating documents manually.