Distribute the Templates

The final task in the template development process is to distribute your template sets so they can be used for assembly. Before doing this, you must first identify who will use your templates.

If you’ve automated your templates for your own practice, there may not be a distribution plan—you can assemble documents from the same templates you are editing. Or, if you’d like to separate template development from document assembly, you can create a new library and copy your completed templates to a different folder. As you make corrections to the templates, you can update those files saved in the assembly-only location.

If you plan to share your templates with others in the firm, you should place copies of the files on a network location for your co-workers. You should restrict access to the templates as much as possible to keep users from inadvertently changing the files. Some ways you can do this include:

• Making the network folder where the templates are saved read-only. (You should also make the template files themselves read-only.)
• Placing a copy of the files on a network and then having users import the library to their local drives for assembly-only. (See Copy Templates to New Locations and Import One Library Into Another.)

Another option is to publish your templates using HotDocs' publishing feature. Publishing options are only available to HotDocs Developer users, however. For information on upgrading your license, please contact your sales representative.