Exchange pro/livecycle designer<?> ability to allow saveform in reader

[Former Community Member]

Hi



I read recently that pdf's created in exchange pro (and possibly livecycle designer) can be set to have a limited ability to allow saving and editing of forms from within the acrobat reader software (the same functionality as reader extensions server but on a very limited scale)!



If this is the case how do you go about activating this ability? I haven't come across it in the properties dialogues and am not even sure that what I read was correct information. I really would appreciate clarifacation.



thanks



Lawrence

[gkaiseril]

You can not use "Designer" to provide the "Extended Reader Rights" this can only be done in Acrobat 8. This means you have to save your "Designer" form. Then open the form in Acrobat * Professional and then select the "Enable User Rights", or using the distribute form feature.




Filling in form fields and saving the file

[Former Community Member]

When I open my PDF in Acrobat Reader 8, and try to execute an importData(), it only works if I certify the document. Just choosing Enable User Rights does not work at all. I hear so many answers on how to make it work, but what is the real answer.

[Former Community Member]

I have created several forms and then reopened in Acrobat 8 and enabled user rights. The forms do save data in Acrobat Reader presently. However, after repeated use the file size of the saveable forms increases astronomically. That is, a file size that starts at 450K soon becomes 1M and then before too long becomes 10M. IS there a way to have Acrobat 8 or Acrobat Reader purge old stored information?

[Former Community Member]

Hey Selkin,



This has been an issue that has been mentioned and I also documented the growth of the file size, but to my knowledge, no one from Adobe has ever responded. I'm not sure if it's a bug or a "feature," but I know in my troubleshooting I didn't even need to add data to make the file size increase. Simply opening and saving caused an increase in size...

[Former Community Member]

Lisa and Selkin,



I too have found that there may very well be a BUG in the reader-rights enabling feature of Adobe Acrobat 8.0 through 8.1. When PDF forms are saved with reader-rights enabled, performing repetitive File>SaveAs commands results in the unusual behavior of the file size growing exponentially regardless of whether you add data or delete data from the form. The expected behavior would be that if you add a little data: the file size grows a little and if you delete a little data: the file size shrinks a little. This is NOT the case with reader rights-enabled forms regardless of whether you perform the File>SaveAs operations in Acrobat 8.1 OR Reader 8.1.



There is a very easy way to test this unexpected behavior (bug):



Create a simple form in Adobe Acrobat 8.1 by:



1)Open Acrobat and select from the menu: File>Create PDF>From Blank Page.



2) Drag and drop a few (say 20) text box controls onto the form.



3) Fill in the text box controls with some data.



4) Save 2 versions of this form: one with reader-rights and the other without reader-rights. (As an example, the filenames could be: "blank_form.pdf" and "blank_form_RE.pdf")

The form named "blank_form_RE.pdf" is the one that contains the reader-rights.



5) Open "blank_form_RE.pdf" in Reader 8.1 and perform multiple File>SaveAs operations with data deletion and data addition combinations. You will find that the file size either stays the same or starts growing abnormally large. The size of the file NEVER gets smaller even when you clear the form of all the data! This behavior occurs even when you open the "blank_form_RE.pdf" file in Acrobat and repeat the same test sequence.



6) But when you open the non reader-rights enabled form (blank_form.pdf") in Acrobat and perform the testing described in step #5, you will see expected file size growth/shrinkage behavior.



We have alerted the fine people at Adobe to this problem and we are awaiting confirmation from them as to whether or not this is in fact a BUG in the reader-rights enabling feature of Acrobat 8.0-8.1.



I will post the results of my finding on this forum when I know more.

[Former Community Member]

Lisa and Selkin,



I called Adobe's tech support in regards to redaer-righte enabled file size bloating and they are stating that this is a known behavior/feature. I have no idea how one interprets file size bloat during a 'File>SaveAs' as a "feature".

[gkaiseril]

There is probably additional code being added to allow Reader to save. So I would guess that if you users with Reader to be able to save the PDF form you have to the additional code.



Just a thought.