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what is s/w to use either reader extension or form server or both?

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Former Community Member
Hi,



I have developed a form using adobe livecycle designer,my requirement is i need that form to be accessed by all in the intranet and the end users should be able to fill the data online or offline and then submit back,so that i can capture the data and update to the database.what are the softwares i need to acheive this requirement,either livecycle forms or livecycle reader extension or both.Please help me about this i am very much confused.



Regards,

Sangeetha
3 Replies

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Former Community Member
In order to fill a form in offline and save it for later submission using Adobe Reader (vs. Acrobat), you will need to reader enable the form using Reader Extensions. Outside of that requirement, you shouldn't need Forms unless you want the form to be pre-filled with data based on the user's logins, info from your backend systems, etc. or you need to post the form as PDF and then extract the form data as XML.



You can design your form to submit XML to a servlet that processes the XML and updates your backend database.



Rob Gabbard

Cardinal Solutions Group

www.cardinalsolutions.com

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Level 9
Paraphrasing Rob...



1. With a regular PDF form, you can:

- submit the data (XML) via http (to a regular web application, implemented as a servlet or whatever)

- submit the data via email



2. With a regular PDF form using "Free Reader", you CANNOT:

- have your end users save a partially completed form

- invoke a web service from the form

- digitally sign the form, add comments, and another few restrictions.



3. LC Forms allows you to:

- prefill a form with data before it's gets sent to the user

- allow your end users to submit the form as PDF (rather than XML), and you can then extract the XML from the PDF



If you want to get around the restrictions of #2, you can either:

- get your end-users to purchase a copy of Acrobat

- Reader-Enable the form. Reader-enabling allows a form to behave as if it were inside Acrobat, even though it is really being displayed in Reader. (It's basically like buying a form-specific copy of Acrobat for all your end-users.)



Howard

http://www.avoka.com

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Level 2
This may seem random but can I (with a LiveCycle Designer ES designed Form, WITH a Reader Extensions License) submit both XML and a PDF (with only one submission button)?