How to click a button in PDF form with iText? - pdf

Question

I have to fill PDF form with some data. This form contains a few tables with "Add" button which adds new row with inputs to this table, for example to "FOREIGN PATENT DOCUMENTS".
I need to "click" this button in my code using iText a few times, add necessary rows, get input names there and fill them. How can I do this with iText? Could anybody provide me a code example?
My PDF file with form https://drive.google.com/open?id=0BwtWU1543EbTQ3A3b2dZcW9qYk0
This file is predefined and I can't regenerate it.

Answer 1

You don't "click" a button programmatically. You just provide the data that is necessary, and the form will adapt.
See the FillXFA example. We have a purchase_order.pdf that looks like this:
This document has an "Add item" button to add more line items (which results in creating more pages if necessary). That button only makes sense if there's a GUI, but when you fill out the form programmatically, there aren't any buttons to push. You just provide the XML with the data (e.g. data.xml), like this:
public void manipulatePdf(String src, String dest)
throws IOException, DocumentException {
PdfReader reader = new PdfReader(src);
PdfStamper stamper = new PdfStamper(reader,
new FileOutputStream(dest));
AcroFields form = stamper.getAcroFields();
XfaForm xfa = form.getXfa();
xfa.fillXfaForm(new FileInputStream(XML));
stamper.close();
reader.close();
}
The result looks like this: purchase_order_filled.pdf
As you can see, multiple lines were added, without pushing any button.
Important: I see that you have a hybrid document. I think you should make it a pure XFA form. This code won't work if you keep the AcroForm fields.