Registration and submission forms have at least 3 mandatory fields:
First name
Last name
Email
You can add any number of additional fields following the instructions below.
Add a field
In the organizer panel, navigate to your form.
Click Add field.
There are 7 common field types across all forms:
Short answer. For short, single-line text answers.
Long answer. For longer text answers that may require multiple lines.
Single select. For multiple-choice questions where participants can select only one option (radio buttons).
Multi select. For multiple-choice questions where participants can select one or more options (checkboxes).
Dropdown. For multiple-choice questions where participants select one option from a dropdown menu.
File upload. Allows participants to upload a file. You can choose which file types are accepted: all file types, images (PNG, GIF, or JPG), PDF documents, or Word documents (.doc or .docx). The all file types option doesn't accept archives such as .zip files. Each file can be up to 100 MB.
Instructions. Not an input field, but a block of text that can be added to the form to provide information or instructions to participants.
Registration and submission forms also offer Country list, a dropdown menu that allows participants to select their country.
Some forms also include form-specific field types. Submission forms offer Poster, Figures, Slides, Video and Tracks (one of each per form), and review forms offer Score. Submission forms also come with the submission title, authors and abstract fields.
Only the Poster field shows a file as the presentation poster, in the Poster tab of the presentation page. A File upload field named "Poster" doesn't do this. If your form has one, add a Poster field and ask participants to upload their poster again.
Note: the Video and Tracks fields are available with the Pro plan. The Tracks field also requires tracks to be created first.
Field settings
You can click the Edit icon to edit a field. This will open a side panel where you will see different options:
Label. The text the participant sees for this question. This is the public name of the field itself.
Description. An additional text box to specify instructions.
Short label. It is used to identify the field in a short, concise format. It displays for example in your data table, on receipts or sometimes on the event website.
Mandatory. Determines if the participant must select a value for this field.
Hidden field. Hides a specific field from the registration form. It is only visible to organizers.
Add a link to your text
To add a link in an Instructions field or in the Description of a field, use the toolbar of the text box:
Click the Edit icon of the field.
In the Instructions or Description box, select the words for the link.
Click the link icon (Link) in the toolbar.
Paste the full URL.
Press Enter or click the check mark. If you close the URL box without this step, the link isn't added.
Click Save.
Multiple choice options settings
For Single select, Multi select and Dropdown fields of registration and submission forms, you can edit additional parameters for each option of those questions.
Limit quantity. Determine if there's a maximum number of times this option can be selected.
Availability period. Determine a start and end date outside which the option can't be selected. You can specify a start date only, an end date only or both. In the example below, the Researcher option is available until Sept. 1st 2024.
Note: You can't delete the last 2 options of a Single select field, because a radio button group with one option isn't accessible. For Multi select and Dropdown fields, you can't delete the last option.
Delete a field
If other parts of your event use a field, Fourwaves doesn't let you delete it. You see the message This field can't be deleted. The message lists what uses the field:
Conditional logic rules
Confirmation emails
Badges content
Certificates content
Coupon codes
To delete the field, remove or replace these references first. Then delete the field again.
To see where a field is used, click Linked in next to the field on your form. For example, Linked in 2 places. A window opens with one tab for each type of reference.
The same rule applies to the options of a Single select, Multi select or Dropdown field. You can't delete an option that conditional logic or a coupon code uses.