More Enabling Features for Adobe Reader
by Ted Padova
2 Votes
My number one ranking new feature added to Acrobat is definitely the new permissions you can grant for Adobe Reader users. In Acrobat 7 we saw the first introduction of a command that permitted us to enable a PDF document with certain usage rights to expand the functionality of Adobe Reader. When a file was enabled using Acrobat Professional an Adobe Reader user could participate in Commenting and Review sessions. Reader users could add comment notes and markups, and they could save their edits.
Enabling PDFs for Commenting
Acrobat 8 still has a menu command available for enabling files for Comment & Review. You enable a PDF for Adobe Reader users for Commenting by selecting the Comments > Enable for Commenting in Adobe Reader command shown in Figure 1.
This command opens a Save As dialog box. Click Save and the file is enabled for commenting in Adobe Reader. Adobe Designer XFA forms can be enabled for commenting as well as any other kind of PDF file. However, using this command won’t add special features for Adobe Reader users to save form data or add digital signatures.
Enabling Forms
Enabling PDFs from Acrobat Professional was a major breakthrough for providing tools that help Adobe Reader users take more advantage of the Reader program. In Acrobat 8, Adobe has continued to add more functionality to the enabling features in Acrobat Professional. Notice you have another menu command under the Advanced menu shown in Figure 2 for enabling PDFs with Reader usage rights.
What’s new with the enabling features in Acrobat 8? With a simple menu command in the Advanced menu in Acrobat Professional you can add Adobe Reader usage rights for:
- Save form data. That’s right. The new Acrobat 8 Professional now lets you enable forms for Reader users to save the data they add to a form.
- Commenting and drawing markups. Choosing this command enables the PDF for forms saves, digital signatures and commenting.
- Sign an existing signature field. Forms that have a digital signature field can be signed using a digital signature in Adobe Reader.
- Digitally sign a document anywhere on the page. If a digital signature field is not present, Reader users can still sign a document. Once the file is enabled, a signature can be applied anywhere on a page in the file.
When you select Advanced > Enable Usage Rights in Adobe Reader the Enable Usage Rights in Adobe Reader dialog box shown in Figure 3 opens.
Click Save Now and your file is enabled with the four items described above. You need Acrobat Professional for all enabling features. These commands are not available to Acrobat Standard users (Acrobat Standard available for Windows only in Acrobat 8). When you select the Enable Usage Rights for Adobe Reader menu command and click Save Now all enabling features are added to the PDF.
What about Adobe Designer XFA forms? I’m pleased to report that forms, just like commenting features, created in Adobe Designer can also be enabled with Adobe Reader usage rights. Just open a Designer form in Acrobat and select Advanced > Enable Usage Rights for Adobe Reader. The same dialog box opens and you click Save Now to enable the Designer form.
A question that may come to mind for many users is what is the distinction between enabling forms using Adobe Acrobat Professional and using Adobe LiveCycle Reader Extensions Server (LRES). After all, LRES is a server product costing much more than Acrobat and is used for, among other things, enabling PDFs for Reader users to save form data.
Adobe wants to keep this distinction clear and there are licensing restrictions that do apply to enabling PDFs for Reader users. It’s all specified in the End User License Agreement (EULA) you agree to when you install Acrobat Professional. Be certain to carefully read the EULA so you understand all licensing restrictions applied to Acrobat.
To summarize the EULA as it relates to enabling PDFs, you are granted permission for enabling a PDF for a maximum of 500 uses. This means that if you post a PDF enabled form on your Web site and 500 people fill out the form, you’re within the licensing agreement. If you enable a form where more than 500 people fill out and submit the form back to you, you’re not complying with the licensing in the EULA. There are many uses for staying within the 500 limit. You might want to enable files used as a purchase order form, a travel expense form, a vacation leave form, etc. The form can be used by several Adobe Reader users many times, but needs to stay within the 500 use limitation.
For a huge number of appliications this new enabling feature is designed for people who don’t have industrial strength needs for forms distribution that require purchase of LRES. A charity golf tournament, a small conference, a PTA event, etc. are all likely candidates for using the new enabling features in Acrobat Professional.
Distribute Form
Another new feature in Acrobat 8 is the Forms > Distribute Form command. This command is designed for people who want to deploy forms and collect the form data locally on their computers. When you select Forms > Distribute Forms, the Distribute Forms wizard opens that walks you trough a few step-by-step panes to prepare a form for distribution. When the form is distributed it is also enabled with Adobe Reader usage rights.
When you distributed a form in earlier versions of Acrobat using a Submit button, an Adobe Reader user could not submit a PDF document back to you. A Submit button on a PDF form was restricted to submitting the FDF data only and you needed to import that data into a PDF document on your end or collect and route the data in other ways.
In Acrobat 8 you can now use the Distribute Form command that enables the PDF document for Reader users and permits the Reader users to send the PDF document back to you with field data.
Can you aggregate data from multiple users in Acrobat 8? For the answer to this question, you need to come back and seen my next article in this series.
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