Follow steps in the "protect a section of text" instructions, above, to re-apply the section protection Note:Once you put a password on a section, you will be prompted for that password before receiving any dialog that might have a chance to access that section of text. You would have to lock these fields (Ctrl+F11) before printing. Microsoft Word provides a function called Restrict Editing that lets you either lock down the form in its entirety or allow users to access only the fillable areas within the form. How to Protect Your Microsoft Word Documents. Some useful form controls are: To set up a Word merge: Step 1 - Create the MS Word document that will be used as the template. Lock Down Form Create your table and key in the labels or values you would like to protect as you normally would. In the Protect group, click Restrict Editing. In the Tabs area on the right, check the box beside "Developer". You can accomplish this by locking the field. ; In the Controls group, click the Legacy Tools option and select Text Form Field. On the toolbar ribbon, f rom the Review tab, under Protect, click Protect Document, and then click Restrict Formatting and Editing. By following this, next time whenever when the user needs to open the same file, the MS Word will ask the user to enter the password to open the file. Microsoft Office Word 2007 To Unlock Fields 1. To lock a field so that field results are not updated, click the field… In the Word Options window, Click on "Customize Ribbon" in the left-hand sidebar. By doing this whenever user tries to open the word file, MS Word will prompt for password to open respective file. Users can protect the word files data by applying a password to them. If you want to password protect your document, you can go to the Review tab and click Protect Document. There may be times when you want to make sure a field does not get updated. This will prevent you from making any edits to your fields, but will activate them so they are usable. A user can protect or lock a word document by adding a password to it. Let us tell you how, open the document that you want to lock and click on ‘Save As’ option. Word 2016 Lock Document with Fillable Field I have a lengthy .docx that I'm trying to lock for editing but I want to allow the end users to edit several text form fillable fields. Page fields (which display page numbering) do not need to be updated manually (they update when you go the Print Preview). ; Continue to select input cells and insert controls until you are finished. Note: If you do not rename the field, then the data merged within will be the same for all like-named fields. DIY Approaches to Lock and Unlock a Word Document Approach 1: How to Lock a Microsoft Word File? ; Click the Developer tab. Can this be done? Optional: Close the Protect Document pane on the right. The fields are now locked. On the "Developer" tab 1 , in the "Controls" group 2 are a number of available form control fields. Adding Form Controls. You can also lock fields to prevent automatic updating of the field. ; Select a cell where you would like users to enter data. Step 3 - Create a Special - MS Word Merge custom field. Locking prevents a field from being updated; the last result is kept until you unlock the field and then update it. 5. Fill out the necessary fields and click the Sign button. Locking fields. Click OK. Click Protect Form. If the Review tab is not viewable: a. Step 2 - Upload the Word document to a SmartFolder. This thread is locked. See Also. To lock a field, perform these steps: Select the field you want to lock. You may be asked to confirm the digital signature, then click OK. If you Ctrl+A, then Ctrl+F11, you'll get most of the fields in the document body, but you'd still need to lock fields in the header/footer that you didn't want updated. Also, I can't find a Form in Word that matches my document and have the Developer tab activated.