can LC Designer produce a flat PDF, not form, as a template for dynamic content?

[Former Community Member]

Can LiveCycle Designer produce a flat PDF, not form, as a template for dynamic content?

[djaknow]

You can certainly create templates, but by definition a form with dynamic content would have to be a dynamic form. A flat PDF would be completely non-interactive, literally an electronic piece of paper.

[Former Community Member]

Define what you mean by a flat PDF ...many people have different definitions for that.

Paul

[Former Community Member]

I do not want a form! I want a flat noninteractive PDF created with dynamic content. I want to know if LiveCycle Designer will do that, or do I need another product.

A flat PDF is a piece of paper read on the screen. For instance report output is a flat PDF file.

[djaknow]

So you want a screen readable PDF requiring no interaction from the user, correct? If so, when you reference dynamic content are you saying some portion of the PDF will change based on some other data source?

[Former Community Member]

The PDF will not change once it gets to the client. It is report output. A data source will be used on the server to place dynamic content in the template.

[Former Community Member]

No designer will not do that ...LiveCycle Output Server will do that .....it uses templates created from Designer XDPs where you build the base of your document ...using fields to indicate where the dynamic content will go and Output will take that XDP file and the asssociated data file and make a flat PDF (No Form at all - just content). Typically this solution is used for batches of files (think of creating bills or statements) as opposed to single file.

Hope that helps

Paul

[Former Community Member]

I do want to create a single file and I do want it to have dynamic content. Why assume I want batch processing? When you say "created from Designer XDPs", does that mean LiveCycle Designer ES? Can the same product used to create interactive forms also be used to create noninteractive flat files? That is my question. If a different server product is needed we can get that.

[Former Community Member]

Yes that means LiveCycle Designer .....the XDP is an XML file that describes the template that you want. It is turned into a PDF by the Designer as well as the LC Server I mentioned. The Designer creates interactive content (not what you asked for), the server can do the same as well as flat PDFs. I mentioned the batch mode because that is how people generally use it or they use it for real time creation of the reports but it tends to be high volume (it is a server product so it will bepriced that way). You can create an XDP that has text and "floating fields" on it. Floating Fields are special in that you can merge data with the template and once the data is put into the field it is turned into text (non-interactive). This woudl be useful for testing (requires a  hands on approach) but if there is any kind of volume that you are looking for this will not be useful. The server side can be automated so that no human intervention is required.

Paul

[Former Community Member]

Thanks, Paul. You're being very helpful. If you could entreat me a bit more, we have several copies of LC Designer, and we have an Adobe Server running. What is needed to be installed on the server to facilitate LiveCycle Output. We may not need to purchase anything but merely install or turn on what we already have.

[Former Community Member · Accepted solution]

There is a module called LiveCycle Output that is an option in teh LiveCycle Server (like Process Manager or Reader Extesions etc...)

Paul