These forums are now Read Only. If you have an Acrobat question, ask questions and get help from one of our experts.

How to go from Indesign to Acrobat PDF 8 to editing a form

Abbica
Registered: Feb 4 2009
Posts: 38

Hi, I am just looking for some advice regarding being asked by my boss could I convert our application forms (range from 2pg to 12pg documents), which are all pdf'd to Acrobat 8, to interative pdf's where I can fill in the fields, so we can omit handwriting errors which is a big problem for us.

I have dabbled in this previously using the form tools in Acrobat professional but I want to do this properly so I tried Adobe LiveCycle Designer which seems to be the program for me or is it?? I was also told to use Acrobat, Forms, Run Field recognition but when I did this, it only recogised small boxes which I drew in indesign, it wouldn't recognise the larger text fields. Or, has Acrobat 9 got a new better tool for automatically making a fill in form?

Basically, is there a simpler method or program or anything I am totalling missing altogether for creating an online interative form as I have a lot to do. Thank you for any advice at all. I am at a loss with this.

My Product Information:
Acrobat Standard 8.0, Windows
dbaker
Expert
Registered: Feb 10 2006
Posts: 413
Hi -

There are a few different ways you could go about this, as you have seen in your experiments. Regardless of your method, you're going to have to draw and name fields. It says your product is Acrobat Standard 8, but you have used Live Cycle Designer which is part of the Professional/Pro package, so I'll give you a couple of Pro solutions. You can either: use the form tools in Acrobat and add the form fields to your PDF manually or use the PDF or InDesign pages in LiveCycle Designer to add your fields manually. Anyway you choose, you still have to add fields.

donna.

A prolific author and writer of many Acrobat books, as well as books on graphic and Web design software.
Donna lives on a lakeshore in central Canada, where all manner of wildlife from muskrats to coyotes come to call.

Abbica
Registered: Feb 4 2009
Posts: 38
Thank you Donna for your answer, I have Acrobat Professional 8 and Adober LiveCyle Design. Which would you recommend to use for this task? I am currently back to using Pro 8.

I am currently changing all my boxes in indesign to lines for conversion to Acrobat pro 8 as Run Form field recognition seems to work best with lines. Does Acrobat Pro 9 have a more up to date feature with regard to this? The thought of editing all forms in indesign and altering them all manually in form field recognition. Ahhhh! So, would you mind if I ask you a few questions which I can't seem to find the anwere for:-
a) In text field properties, under General/name, do I have to enter a name in here every time, very time consuming. Is this only for database reading, if submitted by email as we are just saving and printing.
b) Our applicaiton forms change regularily, would I have to re-insert the fields manually everytime a form changed becuase I would have to alter in indesign, then pdf it again? Is there a way to update a pdf with the fields attached instead of me having to go through the entire document again, fixing the fields, name tags etc again.
c) We have to be able to save the forms onto our desktops, which explains, go to Advanced>Enable usage Rights in advober Reader adn that is it as a colleague of mine, who was on Acrobat 5 Pro couldn't save as, she could only save which we don't want?
d) how do I insert a print button, can't find it anywhere, unlike Adobe LiveCycle which was blatant.
Thansk for any help yet again, new to all this so your help is much appreciated.