Apply form template to existing PDF

Is it possible to apply a pre-defined form template to existing PDF files in Acrobat Pro 9? Basically I just want to apply 2 signature fields to a pdf document (manufacturing drawing) using some sort of preset. This would get around having to re-create the same form on hundreds of documents.
Thanks in advance,
Jason

You can programmatically add form fields with JavaScript. You can use the code with a custom menu item or toolbar button, or in a batch sequence so you can add the signature fields to many documents at once. If you need help with the code, you might want to post in the Acrobat Scripting forum.
George

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Fillable form added to existing pdf??? how???

I just signed up the trial adobe form central - not sure if that's what i need - i have a do already - i just want to make the blank - fillable? can i use this to do that and if yes, how do i upload the existing form?
Thanks, Mandy

You cannot import and existing PDF form into FormsCentral. You have to create the form from scratch or template within the FormsCentral application.
Randy

Is it possible to embed a newly created form into an existing PDF?

Hi,
I have an exisiting pdf (3 pages of text and images) that I need to add a form to on the last page. I've created a form but don't know how to embed it, and I have a feeling there's a better way to do it.
The idea is that we can then email this PDF to people and they'll be able to fill it in.
I'm a new user and can't find out how to do this- I'm sorry if i've missed something obvious!
Thank you in advance.

Hi;
You can do it with Adobe Acrobat...
First: Create your form in FormsCentral and from the Distribute tab "Save Submission-Enabled PDF"
Second: Open your existing PDF with text and images in Adobe Acrobat and in Acrobat go to Help - Find and type "Insert Page from File" (under Tools depending on the version of Acrobat you are using) and add the FormsCentral PDF to the existing PDF and save
The resulting PDF file would include the FormsCentral form and submitters data would be collected on FormsCentral servers for you to view/download in the View Responses tab. You can also set up Email Notifications and Submission Reciepts that would all work with this PDF form.
Thanks,
Josh

Acrobat SDK to create form fields on existing pdf

I am trying to implement a browser based editor for my company's application. This requires to fetch an already created pdf document, add form fields on it and display on a browser.
Does it look feasible? Does Acrobat SDK allow to create a fillable pdf from an existing file?
Vishal

Vishal:
Take a look at the FormFieldSampleService in the Datalogics PDF Java Toolkit. The toolkit was developed by Adobe and, as you'll see in the sample, provides an API to add fields to a PDF file.
FormFieldServiceSample | Datalogics Developer Resources

How do I Edit an Existing PDF Form Without Losing Form Functionality

I'm brand new to Acrobat but familiar and proficient with Flash, PhotoShop Premiere Pro, After Effects, Dreamweaver, Fireworks etc.
The company I work for sells office supplies. We sell 57 distinct items. We have Acrobat 9. I am designing a PDF order form with fields that can be emailed to our clients as an attachment. They fill out the form, it calculates the total, they send it back to us, we fill and ship the order. Basic and straightforward.
I can add form fields to my order/pricelist... not a problem. The question is:
Once I have brought a PDF into Acrobat and add 57+ fields and calculations, which is a time consuming process, how do I edit an item price at a later date, if someone in the company decides to make a change to our pricing?
See..., If I save the original Microsoft Excel document as a PDF, Acrobat can't edit the text for some reason. Something to do with "Renderable Text". Now if I open the PDF saved from Microsoft Excel in Adobe Illustrator, I can use the text tool to make changes. That doesn't help me... just saying. Why can't I edit "Renderable Text" with the Acrobat Text Tool? Someone in a forum stated that Acrobat is NOT a word processing program! If that is an accurate statement, it would appear that Acrobat can at least work with base PDF documents to make certain types of modifications and add functionality. Is that correct?
Here's the problem. I create a PDF with form functionality. Everything works great. The boss says, I want to change the price of the scissors. I can't change the text in Acrobat because of the "Renderable Text" nonsense. Does this mean that I have to re-apply all of the form fields and calculations to the new base PDF document every time there is a minor change? I know there has to be a simple work around. Should I upgrade to a newer version of Acrobat?
Is it possible to save the original existing form functionality as a layer or overlay to be applied to the new modified base PDF document? Kind of like so many other Adobe products do including PhotoShop, Fireworks, Premiere Pro, After Effects, Flash etc., so that all of the form functionality can be applied in one big chunk? Premiere Pro has the time-saving feature of "Paste Attributes". It's a real time saver.
It may be simpler to just direct me to a video that goes through the process of creating a PDF order form with fillable fields that multiplys quantity by unit price and totals one column.
I already created a prototype of the form in PhotoShop which can be saved as a PDF. The finished order document appearance has 95 horizontal 3px wide lines and 6 vertical 3px lines, kind of like what one might expect to see in an Excel spread sheet. The form also contains some graphics and unconventional text areas that acrobat could overlay text fields and everything would be fine.
With these great number of horizontal dividing lines, It doesn't seem practical or even possible to create the basic layout in Acrobat. As I originally stated, I'm new to Acrobat and would like suggestions for a workflow that enables easy editing of an existing PDF document with form fields. I want to avoid the monumental task of re-doing all of the fields and calculations.

For what you are trying to do that is probably what you want -- Replace Pages. There are a few more issues that you need to be aware of since this is a business form. If customers are using Reader XI, it is not an issue.
On the renderable text, can you see the text list when you look at the font tab in the document properties (ctrl-D)? If not, they you do not really have fonts to edit. This may be the type of fonts you used in the original or the way in which you did the conversion to PDF. You need to have fonts that are on your system and then be sure to embed them (otherwise others may not be able to read them because of different OS or such).
As to e-mailing the form, that is fine (though there are sometimes problems with various clients and PDFs -- but usually on the sending end).
For collecting the data you may want to try a different route. For users of Reader XI, they can save the form with the data. Prior versions could not do that unless you enabled the form for Reader. However, this latter process has a 500 form use limit -- A license issue. If the data is submitted, then it does not make a difference. The folks with Reader XI can still save the form with the data, others will have to print a copy for their records.
The data can be imported to the form on your end and so you would have the exact same results as what was filled out. However, the submission process should be set up to submit to a web script for your receipt and not use mailto. The latter has problems that you have no control over due to proper operation with the mail client on the user machine. Typically the mail client must be the default and use MAPI. In any case, it is not reliable (not for business use). So submission to a web script is useful. The data in AcroForms would be of the type FDF (or possibly XFDF). If for some reason use created the form with Designer, that limit any editing in Acrobat since it is no longer a real PDF, but an XML container that Acrobat and Reader can display and interact with, but not change. Again, submission to a web script is still preferred.
For dealing with a web script and some coding for various languages, you can check out the FDF Toolkit. It has been around a while, but should still handle the CGI needs of the submission. In addition, it has tools for adding the data to a database and other typical operations for data collection. You can save the FDF files and import them to the form and deal with the data there also.
The use of Replace pages would do the job if all your form fields will still need to be in about the same location. Form fields are mark up and the pages are referred to as the document. Thus the replace pages will just original page and leave all the form fields. You will still need to go back and fix the value within the fields themselves, but that is a field edit.

I want to view the results in the form template, rather than in rows and columns, I can print them as .pdf but want to view them online

e.g   DOB:
       Name:
If this is the form and   100 people entered it I would like to go to form template and click forward arrow to go thru all 100, so I can review all of the results
Like you can in access
thanks

You can download the PDF that you are wanting to look at. In safari if there is a link to a pdf you can usually Control Click or Right Click and select to save it to the desktop. From there, you can open the PDF with Acrobat.
If i'm not mistaken, though, PDF's will default to Apple Preview, so if you want PDFs to open with Acrobat by default, you can set it that way by highlighting a PDF then hitting (Apple) I. In the Info pane, expand the "Open With" field, set the program to Acrobat, then tell it to Change All if you want all PDFs to default to Acrobat.
Hopefully that will help!

Is there a way to take an existing PDF and make it into a form that will aggregate the responses?

Is there a way to take an existing PDF and make it into a form that will aggregate the responses?

Sabian has pointed you to an older Acrobat X tutorial.
It depicts the use of acrobat.com "workspaces".
"Workspaces" are going away soon.
See:
https://forums.adobe.com/docs/DOC-4203
So, what is shown in the Adobe TV session is, basically, obsolete.
For forms you may want to give acrobat.com's (now "Adobe Document Solutions) FormsCentral subscription service a look-see.
https://new.acrobat.com/en_us/products/formscentral.html
Be well...

When creating a fillable form fields from an existing pdf file, how do you set or allow end user to set the font size in the fields?

I successfully created a form filled pdf using an existing pdf document. However, the font size is too large to allow end user to type in information in the form box. Is there a way to 1)globally set all of the form fields when generated to a much smaller font size &/or 2) allow end user to change the font size if needed to put all information in one box without font being so large?

Hi DenisonDoc,
There is no option right now to set properties globally primarily for Text fields. You may make sure fields doesn't contain anything.
Select all the text filed from the form and right click any of the selected field make sure all of them are selected choose properties --> Appearance there you can choose Font Size and Font type.
- End users cant change size and type of font. It is up to designer.
Regards,
Ajlan Huda.

How to generate PDF using FDF file and the PDF form template (PHP)

Hi Folks,
I'm really sorry that I couldn't follow all the valuable discussions going on here, regularly. I need some immediate help.
I NEED A PHP SOLUTION. I'm able to generate FDF files using the PDF Form Template in PHP. So, I have a collection of FDF files, which seeks the PDF template, while opened and populates the template with FDF data. Now if I need to save this PDF file, I have to do it manually clicking SAVE option. But, I need to convert FDF to PDF in bulk. So, I need some PHP based solution. The PHP script takes the PDF template and the FDF file and merges them to generate a complete populated PDF file. I know it's possible, but don't know how. I've seen Adobe FDF Toolkit. But by default it doesn't show any guideline for PHP. Please help me to write this code. I'm a professional coder. I can understand your hints and tutorials. PLEASE HELP GOOD PEOPLE.

The only reason I am responding to this post is because the poster sent me a request through the forum message system asking for my help.
Although I did populate PDFs with FDF data generated by web forms a year or so ago, I have since abandoned that kind of solution. It was a big headache. I found it far more stable and flexible to use html, php and css to populate forms that are almost as nice looking as PDFs.
So my advice is, if you can possibly avoid going the FDF/PDF route, you will be better off.

Insert XML Data Into An Existing PDF Form

I am working on an application, written with XHTML and JavaScript, and running on AIR, so it is a desktop application.
Users enter data into an XHTML form and upon submission I create an XML file of the data using JavaScript.
At any later time users will be able to open the XML file from the application. I will use JavaScript, again, to read the XML and fill in an XHTML form. But at this point I will provide a button for users to generate a PDF with the data. I would then like to insert the XML data into the appropriate fields of the existing PDF form. I would like to continue to do this from within the AIR application using JavaScript.
Is this possible?
What version of Acrobat would I need as the developer? Professional or Standard or Other or None?
What version of Acrobat would the end users need? Professional or Standard or Other or None?
Can this all be done using only JavaScript and the Acrobat SDK? Does using AIR offer any help (all Adobe products)?
When the end user clicks the generate PDF button would Acrobat have to open? Can this be done without the user seeing Acrobat open? Either way is ok, I would just like the user to see an alert saying that the file has be generated and point them to its location on the local machine. But again, this is not a requirement.
Thanks in advance.
Not asking for source code here, just if its possible. :)
I'll figure out the how.

You have two choices
1) You can use JavaScript in your AIR application to communicate with the JavaScript in the PDF to fill in the form directly. This can all be done inside of your AIR app. This is certainly the best route to go and there is (IIRC) a sample in the AIR SDK.
2) You can create an XFDF file from your XML data and then have Acrobat/Reader open the XFDF file to fill in the data.
Both methods will work with Acrobat and Reader - HOWEVER, Reader users won't be able to save the PDF unless it has been Reader Enabled.
Leonard

PDF form template displaying multiple sets of data loaded from xfdf

Hello
I would like to use PDF Forms with data stored in xfdf files.
Is it possible to create pdf form (template) for displaying and printing multiple sets of data stored in xfdf?
For example: pdf form contains 2 sets of data. Form field names: F_1 and F_2.
I have 7 sets od data. All I need is to create pdf and xfdf that can be displayed in PDF reader and printed
as document consisting of 4 the same pages containing different data in form fields loaded from xfdf file.
(something similar to Mail merge in MS Office Word).
How it would be done? Is it possible to make such pdf, xfdf?
If yes, where I can find examples (tutorial) of creating such forms, please?
Thanks.
J. Jas

It is possible but not just a simple import of data.
Each form field in the multiple page PDF would need a unique name not repeated on another page of the PDF. Fortunately the Acrobat form standard includes the "template" object and this object can be spawned or used to add a new page with the form fields automatically renamed with a prefix string of the page number and template added to each form field on the new page. So if one were to import a row from your tab delimited file into the template, one could then spawn a new page from the template with the data and rename the fields so there would be no conflict of like named fields.
A Lesson in Templates for Adobe Acrobat by Dave Wraight
With newer versions of Acrobat there is a mail merge feature.
Create PDFs from Word mail merges

Lose Jpeg images when editing an existing PDF Form in Acrobat X - All other edits update OK

Have just upgraded to Acrobat X and am having problems trying to update an existing PDF Form which includes jpeg images. After all edits are done and I save, previewing the PDF identifies that all of the existing jpeg images within the form no longer display. Unable to figure out what to do to retain these images from the existing PDF.

Hi,
Based on your other post, the original form was developed in LiveCycle Designer. Therefore you would need to edit the form in LC Designer, to reestablish the link to the image files.
Niall

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I am attempting to edit an existing PDF form that has was created as a fillable form. One field needs to be edited. However, I was not the creator of the fillable form.

Hi Bud Zerge,
Unfortunately, we cannot edit a PDF form imported to FormsCentral even if it was created using FormsCentral.

How do I create a fillable form from an existing document (PDF, Word, etc)?

How do I create a fillable form from an existing document (PDF, Word, etc)?

In Acrobat 11 you'd select: Tools > Forms > Edit
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Applying a template to an existing document in Pages '09

Can you apply a template to an existing document that has no template?

goldfilm,
Pages Templates can not be applied to existing documents in the way that you propose. They are basically sample documents.
Jerry

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