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General question about LiveCycle and Acrobat XI Pro

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Level 1

Apologies if this is a common/newbie question.

So a few years ago I was asked to create a 'smart' form for employee use. After a bit of searching I found LiveCycle and was able to download a trial version with a ridiculously long lifespan. After some trial and error I managed to create a very useful form.

I then worked out that I needed a Acrobat Pro in order to create a updatable version of the form that could be distributed to employees by email. So I was granted a licence for that and was working fine, making updates to the form in LiveCycle when needed and then 'finalizing' it in Acrobat.

However now my trial version of LiveCycle has run out and i'm trying to work out a solution to continue using the form. Acrobat Pro tells me that I can't use it to modify the form, so i'm trying to work out if I can recreate it in Pro as it appears to have it's own form creation functionality. However when I try it tells me that the 'Form Central' environment is being closed in July.

So i'm a bit stuck. I don't want to pay for LiveCycle for one form, and i've already had a full Acrobat Pro license purchased for me at considerable cost.

Can anyone help?

For info, the form is very simple. It has a few text boxes to complete, some check box options and drop downs. I would recreate the entire thing in InfoPath but not everyone has access to the software.

Thanks

1 Reply

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Level 7

You can create a form in Acrobat with or without form Central. A form created in Acrobat is generally referred to as an AcroForm. This type of form is not dynamic though you can do some very cool things with it. To create an AcroForm you start with a form design. This can be created in Word, Adobe Illustrator, or virtually any tool used for desktop publishing or design. When you finalize the design you would save or print it as a PDF and bring it into Acrobat Pro and overlay the form fields essentially putting just the fields in place. If you want a dynamic form meaning a form that can grow, easily connect to data sources etc you will need to use LiveCycle Designer as you've done previously. Once the file is created with LiveCycle Designer you cannot edit it in Acrobat. You can reader extend it but that is pretty much all you can do other than interact with the actual form.

My suggestion is that if you've already created the form in LiveCycle continue doing that. LiveCycle Designer is a very powerful tool for creating forms. It will require that you purchase a license and probably also a licenses of Acrobat Pro.