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Info Path or Acrobat

Forum Index > Forms: LiveCycle Designer > Info Path or Acrobat
2008-06-02 12:35:28
BillA
Registered: Feb 11 2008
Posts: 18
Answered

Looking for advice as to the pro's and con's of using MS Info Path 2003 or Acrobat Form (Professional 8 w/livecycle). This is what I'm looking at:

I will be creating an Access db that will maintain information from many divisions within my organization. If it matters; the information gathered will relate to preexisting organization databases.

We would like to populate a form with data that we already maintain and send it to users to complete the form and return it.

We don't necessarily need to 'connect' these forms to the db, but will need to pre-fill data and email the form.

This will be the first time attempting either IP or Acrobat Form. I've done a cursory look at both IP 2003 and Acrobat Forms; I've found many tutorials on this site informative; IP 2003, from what I've found, is somewhat antiquated and lacks the dynamic bells and whistles that Acrobat P8 offers.

One of my pressing questions is how to pre-fill, not connect, data to this soon to be developed form. I’ve experienced difficulty creating multiple instances of a form, one for each instance of a db record.

Any and all suggestions would be welcomed.

Thanks,
Bill

My Product Information:
LiveCycle Designer, Windows
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2008-06-03 07:19:22
#1
lsutton
Expert
Registered: Nov 15 2005
Posts: 51
Bill,

Do you own any of the LiveCycle server products that would allow you to pre-populate the forms or are you looking at pre-populating the forms using Acrobat on your workstation then enabling it and sending it out to the users?
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2008-06-03 07:53:35
#2
BillA
Registered: Feb 11 2008
Posts: 18
Hello Lee,

No LiveCycle server on this end.

The best way to describe what we are looking to do is merge data from a MS Access db to a Form (Acrobat?), then send the pre-populated form(s) to various users who will correct and/or add additional information, returning us the form/data to be imported back into our db.

Does LiveCyle have this capability, and if so; is it possible to automate the emailing of the merged form using the email address from a pre-populated field?

Thank you for your interest and time.
Bill
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2008-06-03 08:04:18
#3
lsutton
Expert
Registered: Nov 15 2005
Posts: 51
You could automate the entire process using Adobe LiveCycle Forms which would allow you to prepopulate the forms with data as well as do all the routing and emailing that you may need to do as part of the process.

Alternatively you could create a data connection with your Access datasource from within Designer.

Some additional questions. How many recipients, and will they be using Acrobat or the free Adobe Reader on their systems to fill in the forms?
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2008-06-03 08:14:46
#4
BillA
Registered: Feb 11 2008
Posts: 18
Not too many Acrobat users, so I need to consider what they have available on their desktops. The recipients of these forms will have at the very least Adobe Reader. I would hope they have an updated version, but assume we will likely have to prompt them to update to Reader 7 to use this form.

We're looking at no more than 100 Forms/recipients.

I'm hesitant on creating a connection to our datasource for many of the recipients work in outside offices and connectivity to the datasource/server may present a problem.

I'm looking to keep the entire process as 'simple' as possible for the recipients.

Bill
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2008-06-03 08:16:16
#5
scottsheck
Registered: May 3 2007
Posts: 138
BillA,

There are many 3rd party programs that will let you fill a PDF without the need of Adobe reader/acrobat. That is, you can use Acrobat or livecycle to create your form, then use one of the 3rd party programs to populate the final PDF.
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2008-06-03 08:21:59
#6
lsutton
Expert
Registered: Nov 15 2005
Posts: 51
Hi Bill, LC Forms is going to be overkill for you if you only have 100+/- users. it would really only be effective for higher volumes of recipients.

I'm not familiar with the 3rd party options that are out there but you will need to keep in mind the fact that the forms will be filled in using the free Adobe Reader so the solution would need to work with a form that has been Enabled using Acrobat.
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