Patent ID: 7523100

Claim:
A computer-implemented method for using a rendered form as a search template, comprising: obtaining a form template for a form, wherein fields of the form are not predefined as to searchability, wherein the form template includes presentation information specifying how the form is to be presented, and type information specifying data types for fields in the form; using the presentation information to generate a rendered search-mode version of the form, rather than a normal version of the form; wherein the search-mode version of the form and the normal version of the form are both derived from the same form template; accepting search criteria in fields of the search-mode version of the form; generating a query based on the search criteria entered into fields of the rendered search-mode version of the form; running the query against a set of previously generated normal version form instances of the form to identify normal version form instances of the form matching the search criteria; and presenting a list of the normal version form instances of the form matching the search criteria to an end-user.