I've been tasked with creating an editable PDF (or similar off-line accessible) form with certain fields (dropdown lists and the like) prepopulated with data. Based on what is selected in the dropdowns, other text fields will be populated with associated data.
Short of creating a Windows Form with 100+ different fields, is there software that has this capability? I know I can't be the only one with a task like this, but having Googled and searched up and down SO I've drawn a blank.
I felt this was the most appropriate exchange to post this in; apologies if I am mistaken.
EDIT
I have access to Acrobat Pro 7 at work, but it seems unable to do what I described above. Do I need a newer version of Acrobat to achieve what I'm after?
Have you considered using InfoPath? It has basically been designed for this purpose and can interact with external data sources (e.g. SharePoint / databases). You can then convert the InfoPath form to PDF if needed, either using your own code or using third party product such as the PDF Converter for SharePoint
I worked on this product so the usual disclaimers apply.
If you want to do a professional job, you need to use the right tool (Adobe Acrobat Pro):
http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobatpro.html
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I need a person to be able to input information into a field in a PDF then later be able to select and copy all information from that field with a single click so they may paste it into another field on a website.
Purpose. I am trying to create a master application which people with disabilities may complete and use as a simple way to fill out other applications. I don't believe I can create an autofill ability which will be useful for the thousands of different methods of job application but I want the human to be able to select the correct field then, in as few clicks as possible, copy information from a field in the PDF and paste it into one they deem as appropriate in another application.
I am an idiot, this is a passion project.
It may be simpler depending on user cases to work inside the browser framework. Here is totally non typical usage for copy data from local personal html into remote form. IT depends heavily on the remote site accepting it can be embedded as if a local frame thus not useful for generic use but may work for controlled caseload's
I have an Acrobat form for work that our salesmen use to create proposals for jobs and their corresponding estimates.
The problem I am facing is that the form only stores data for one customer at a time. I am trying to get it to where they can type in a customers name (or job number, etc.) and it pull up all the form data used for that customer when that exact estimate was done (no matter how long ago it was).
How can I get my PDF form to do this (save current and all previous inputs) and not just save the current data in each editable field at a time?
I currently use Omniform and it does all of this; however, we are trying to switch over to Adobe and I am not too familiar with the software and how I can accomplish this!
Thank you in advance!
If you want to do all the processing local (without server roundtrip) you would have to embed all data in the PDF itself. There are several ways to do this but I would recommend using JavaScript. You would declare this at the document level. You would handle the blur event of the customer name (or other key field), find a match among the multiple customers and populate the secondary fields.
Assuming the data sits somewhere in a database, you would have to generate such a PDF or manipulate an existing template programmatically using a library. Not sure if you are looking to a programming solution or a tool.
Here is more info on JavaScript for Acrobat:
http://www.adobe.com/devnet/acrobat/javascript.html
I have a SharePoint 2010 document library with >7000 xml documents created from infopath forms(Infopath 2007). Now i would like to promote few fields in the form to the SharePoint document library. I could do this only for documents created from the upgraded form, but not for all previously created documents. Although re submitting of old forms will work,It is not possible for me to update all 7000 records to promote the values to the column. Is there a much easier solution, considering the fact that this changes need to be implemented on a production environment too.
Note:The promoted columns will be used to generate graphical report. Any solution acceptable.
I've been through this before, and there's no good answer. If I understand correctly, you have existing InfoPath forms in a doc library, and you now want to promote fields to the document library, but you don't want to open each form one by one, correct?
Note, you most likely don't have to open then re-submit each form, you just have to open the form, and close it. Once you do that, the promoted fields will them show up.
So... what I've done before is this: First, get notepad++ (this allows you to open multiple files in tabs). Secondly, access the the doc library via WebDav (that is, go to the library in SharePoint, then go to the Library tab, and click Open with Explorer). Thirdly, open a large batch of files at once using notepad++ (select files, right-click, open with notepad++). It will take a moment for all the files to load in notepad++ in tabs. Once they are all open in notepad++, hit ctrl-w as fast as you can (which closes each file). Rinse and repeat.
It's not pretty, and I'm sure there's a better way to do this (programatically, perhaps), but this should work. At least you won't have to open each form one by one.
You can do this by relinking the document by powershell or through advanced settings.
My customer actually stores his documents, which are single page automotive forfeits, in a single MS Word document... this method is of course generating a huge file which is slow to open, not to talk about searches.
After a user compiles a document, he may need to print it to manually sign it. Then the document is scanned back and stored in PDF format. The document may be printed again to be
signed a second time by a manager. The doubly signed document is scanned again and saved
overwriting the singly-signed one.
The user wants to be able to search the document using a couple of search keys (the doc number and a sort of a SSN). That is the reason they are using a single file, to be able to search in the file using Word's search feature.
I have to propose an IT solution. I was thinking about giving them a software tool that:
reads a pdf form/template; the template rarely changes
shows the template on the screen and allows the user to input his variable fields in the form
some of the fields must be defined as searchable
the user saves only the form fields, not the whole pdf.
the sw is able to rebuild a document by coupling the template with the fields. I have to find a way to tie the template with the saved fields, so that the template can change (versioning) without breaking the old documents
the tool allows to search in multiple documents, using the defined search fields
the tool allows to print the document to manually sign it; this is the hard part. When the document is signed cannot be changed anymore, but if the document is simply scanned and coupled with the form/fields pdf, then I'll loose the benefits of only storing the data decoupled from the template. Should I only scan the signature and attach it to the document as an image?
What do you suggest to use?
Adobe XML Forms?
Adobe Forms Data Format?
An already existing software?
Other?
For the existing documents, I want allow the customer to import his huge MS Word file into the new system.
Thanks.
Sounds like you want a PDF form template that submits data to a dB that can be searched.
OTOH, if you just save the PDFs, Acrobat Pro can generate an index file from a directory, that can be searched (from reader?). Yep, you can run searches on an index from reader, but can only build them with Acrobat.
I prefer AcroForms to LiveCycle forms myself. There's a lot more software out there that works with 'em. If you go with LiveCycle, you're almost completely locked into Adobe. And Adobe server software is EXPENSIVE.
I'm working with a CMS and need to import data to it using typical html forms. The data itself is in csv files with one page per row. Such is the CMS that importing directly to db isn't possible due to the complexity of the design. It's pretty important that i "fake" usual user interaction because the CMS does a lot of background work that's crucial for the import.
Basically, for each row in the csv file, I need to copy a csv column to a html textfield, or select a checkbox, or click a certain button. One major issue is mapping the data in the csv to actions in the CMS. So if one column contains the string 'foobar' is really means "set the firstName dropdown widget to 'foobar'".
Is there a tool to automate this? I´ve been looking at AutoHotKey, Selendium, Web-Harvester and many other tools but I'm not convinced they are the correct tools. The main problem is being able to interact with the html pages in a easy way.
There are a bunch of tools that do that. Visual Studio Team Test Edition will do this by recording your actions and allow you to modify the resulting C# programming. You can then read from your CSV and replay in a loop.
You can also do this relatively easily if your interface doesn't change much using HTML Agility Pack.
Also I've written regular C# ( HttpWebRequest and Regex ) programs to do this and it's not very difficult either.