Text Blocks

A text block is a reusable template for a letter, an email, or part of a document. Instead of typing fixed text, you work with placeholders (which DEPLAW inserts per case) and optional FEEL logic (which calculates and formats). You’ll find text blocks under Settings → Templates → Text Blocks.

The list

Each row is a text block. Use the practice area filter above to narrow it down by topic; the columns show:

Above the list, + Create text block creates a new one, or you transfer entire sets between systems via Import / Export.

Creating a text block

The editor is organized into header data (what the block is) and the content (what it writes):

The key header fields:

Placeholders & FEEL in the text

In the content editor, you write ordinary text and insert placeholders at the variable spots. Expression highlighting marks them in color. Three tools help with inserting them:

• Simple placeholders – a case value 1:1, e.g. {{MANDANT_NACHNAME}} or {{AKTE_NR}} (the full list is in the variable reference).
• Declined and conjugated placeholders – grammatically adapted variants that are bound to a participant and follow their gender and grammatical case (see gender & case).
• Referenceable placeholders – a reference to other text blocks via their placeholder ID. This lets you compose blocks out of smaller blocks.

For calculations and formatting, use FEEL with the {{=…}} syntax – e.g. {{=euro(FORDERUNG_OFFEN)}} for the formatted outstanding amount, or {{=parseDate(FRIST_ENDE)}} for a date. This is also exactly where DEPLAW’s own FEEL functions (bigDecimal, euro, calcRVGwithDate …) are available.

Gender & case: placeholders bound to participants

For a letter to sound grammatically correct – “Dear Mr. Smith” vs. “Dear Ms. Smith”, or the equivalent gendered forms in German (“an den Mandanten” vs. “an die Mandantin”) – DEPLAW binds certain words to a participant and inflects them automatically according to that participant’s gender and grammatical case. The “Declined and conjugated placeholders” tool above the editor shows all supported words.

Syntax: {{WORD_CASE(ROLE)}}

• WORD – the word to be inflected (e.g. MANDANT, VERSICHERUNGSNEHMER, HALTER, or the salutation SEHR_GEEHRTE_DAMEN_HERREN).
• _CASE – the grammatical case as a suffix: _N nominative, _G genitive, _D dative, _A accusative.
• (ROLE) – the participant role whose gender the inflection follows. The “Simple placeholders” tool shows which roles exist.

Example: {{MANDANT_N(MANDANT)}} inserts “Mandant,” “Mandantin,” or “Mandantschaft” – depending on the salutation of the participant recorded as client. This way, the same text block automatically adapts to every case.

Import & export

Import text blocks / export text blocks transfers entire sets of templates between environments (e.g. from a reference firm) – handy when setting up a new DEPLAW instance.