Acrobat JavaScript, Introduction to Acrobat JavaScript, Acrobat JavaScript Scripting Guide

Using Acrobat JavaScript in Forms

Making PDF Forms Web-Ready

PDF forms can be used in workflows that require the exchange of information over the

Web. You can create forms that run in Web browsers, and can submit and retrieve

information between the client and server by making a

button available in the

form. The button can perform similar tasks to those of HTML scripting macros.

You will need a CGI application on the Web server that can facilitate the exchange of your

form’s information with a database. The CGI application must be able to retrieve

information from forms in HTML, FDF, or XML formats.

In order to enable your PDF forms for data exchange over the Web, be sure to name your

form fields so that they match those in the CGI application. In addition, be sure to specify

the export values for radio buttons and check boxes.

The client side form data may be posted to the server using the HTML, FDF, XFDF, or PDF

formats. Note that the use of XFDF format results in the submission of XML-formatted data

to the server, which will need an XML parser or library to read the XFDF data. The

equivalent MIME types for all posted form data are shown below in

MIME Types for Data Formats

Creating Submit Buttons

application/x-www-form-urlencoded

application/vnd.adobe.xfdf

When you use the Button tool, use the

may specify which data format is used when you select the

necessary for the server to be able to recognize and reconstruct a digital signature, it is

advisable that you choose the

Incremental Changes to the PDF

Creating Reset Form Buttons

In this case, when you create the

able to specify which form fields are reset.

Creating Import Data Buttons

First set up an FDF file with common data. In this case, when you create the

Acrobat JavaScript Scripting Guide