Distributing a form to recipients who use online email accounts

I have the same issue. I suppose I can tell users to use File/Export/xml and then send that file, or even file/save as and send the whole pdf (after having enabled the save as function for Adobe Reader of course)

I tried distributing a form to my gmail address and worked with it last night on my Ubuntu machine. I logged onto my gmail account and downloaded the file to my hard drive. When I filled out the form and clicked the submit button a dialog opened giving me the choice to choose to use either email from my machine or online email. I chose online email and I saved the filled the file to my hard drive so I could manually add it to an email as an attachment and send it. I can manually add the data to the response document but it doesn't do anything to update the information in the Tracker. It still said that the recipient has not responded.

I have tried set up a form distribution and instead of choosing the option to send the form now I have chosen the option to store the file localy for sending later. At least that makes a response document that I can use to manually collect files I send out and receive back. Using the Tracker at that point doesn't even need to come into play really.

I have also tried collecting the data from multiple files in a csv file so I could bring it into Excel but that has end up being alot of work. Especially getting the data in the spread sheet cleaned up and looking good. Using an Acrobat response document which is like working in a spread sheet is fairly easy to look at and filter the data. It just hasn't worked very smoothly so far.

Using Acrobat.com to distribute the form and collect the data seems to work fine for distributing forms and collecting responses and is probably a better option when distributing forms to lots of online email users. At least so far it seems to be working okay. I have only collected responses from myself using two different email addresses so I have no idea how it will work with upwards of twenty. I am soon to find out though.

So far distributing forms via email and even doing email reviews seems like a great idea but useless in my case. I hope others have had success and use it enough to make it worth while.

StevenD, when you say "distribute your form I think that is different from the problem described here. At least what I refer to is a form that a client gets either from a CD I supply or downloads from my website. On the form is a "submit by email" button.

I know AOL users cannot use that to send me the data. I have no experience with gmail so do not know if that is different, but my guess is all web based eamil clients will present the same problem.

I would say that is the case from what I have experienced with gmail so I'm guessing that all types of online email do not work with submit by email.

I am using the Distribute Forms feature in Acrobat that let me distribute a form to as many users as I need to and will keep track of the distributed form in the Tracker so I can see who I sent the form to, who has responded and when, who has not responded. I also can click a link in the tracker to email everyone who hasn't responded all from the Tracker.

So when I send forms out with this method to individuals who use gmail, yahoo mail, msn etc. the submit button won't work for those users of the form and it won't keep track of the users in the Tracker. So the only thing the Submit by email button is good for is people who are using something like Outlook or Thunderbird etc.

I'm putting together a list email addresses that I want to send a form to that has a submit by email button in the form and so far out of 12 email addresses all are online email accounts.

Thanks StevenD.

Bottom line: Gmail, one of the most used email services, is not compatible with Acrobat.

Do you know of any desktop application which is able to creating a new message in an online email service and attach a file to it? I'd be interested to know.
If you define your Gmail account in your desktop email application (like Outlook or Thunderbird) then you would be able to use it with Acrobat.

Gmail is a web service, and not a mail service, that's the problem; mailForm() etc. are relying on mail services (on Windows, the mail services/applications have to be MAPI-compliant).

It is possible to access GMail with a mail client, however (that's what try67 states). But I am not aware of any MAPI-compliant web browser.

I use google apps for email, and usually get around this program with other programs by using the Windows Live Mail on my Windows 7 computer. I don't have outlook.

So, it is really bad that Adobe Acrobat does not work with my email program.(on my computer or with Google apps.

Otherwise, what is the point.

I am still looking for a solution. Peter Skaife (707) 773-7062 peter [at] heroicliving [dot] info