LiveCycle Designer 8.2 documents in Adobe Reader Mac

[bfunk1978]

I work on a web app that uses LiveCycle Designer 8.2 and iTextSharp 4.1.6 (which is just a C# version of iText, which we use to create the PDFs from XFA forms created by LiveCycle Designer) to create dynamic documents.  Users fill out the documents and post the data back to the web app.  The way we're presenting stuff is that each section of the document has its own link within the app, so when you click the edit link it should bring you to the right section of the document and you can fill it out and save the data to the server.

This works great on all of the major Windows browsers - IE8 and later, Firefox, Chrome.  You have to configure the latter two to use the Adobe Reader plugin rather than the built-in plugin, but once you do that it's great.  This is true of both 10.1.6 and 11.0.02.

On the Mac we're having problems.  I know now that Firefox is not supported at all, so my issue here is limited to testing with the latest version of Safari 6 on Mountain Lion. The issues deal with data not always posting back and saving (usually it doesn't on the first try, going back into the page and re-doing your changes and submitting again and it's good).  Also, the edit links occasionally take you to the page you were on previously instead of the right page.  Again, clicking the link a second time works correctly.  And, just as on Windows, the results/behavior is identical between 10.1.6 and 11.0.02. 

Now I realize that we're dealing with older versions of both LiveCycle Designer and iTextSharp, but these documents previously worked.  What kind of things can I look for that would be useful in figuring out what is wrong?  Any suggestions are welcome.

[Jono_Moore]

Are you also checking on the Mac that Reader is opening the files and not Preview?

Check here for more info (haven't had to deal with the problem myself):

http://www.assuredynamics.com/index.php/2011/02/pdf-forms-in-apple-preview/

[bfunk1978]

Yes, I'm pretty sure.  The save/print floating toolbar that's specific to Acrobat Reader appears at the bottom of the form, and the purple bar with the button to highlight fields appears just like regular Acrobat Reader.  In fact, prior to installing Acrobat Reader, I got the "you need to upgrade your Acrobat reader" message.  So yeah, I'm positive it's displaying in Acrobat Reader.

Now that I have Acrobat Reader installed, I get forms that don't save correctly on the first try and the wrong page opening on the first try.  Second tries always work. 

Thanks for the response, I do appreciate the reality check.

[bfunk1978]

I don't get to edit my OP but I should note that the only browser things even try to work on, on the Mac is Safari.  Chrome recognizes the 10.1.6 version of the plugin but fails to load, and doesn't recognize the plugin at all when I install 11.0.02 of Acrobat Reader.

So I'm down to just Safari, and we're still a little stuck on why things aren't posting back properly on the Mac (with both 10.1.6 and 11.0.02), when they work fine in every browser on Windows. 

I know we're using an older version of LiveCycle Designer, but I'm hesitant to say "let's just upgrade everything" and jeopardize things working at all in the name of hopefully fixing something on the Mac, only to have to revert for some reason.

[bfunk1978]

I'm able to kind of boil down my problems on the Mac to "everything works on the second try".  THe first time I post data back from the form, it fails to save so re-loading the form has the old data.  If I immediately make my changes again and post them back again, it works.

This is only happening wiht the Mac version of the plugin.  If I don't use Acrobat Reader (isntead using Preview) nothing works at all; I get a message to update Reader.  So I'm sure I'm using the plugin.  Any hints would be very helpful.

[bfunk1978]

I think I've figured out part of the problem, and it's not iTextSharp or LiveCycle's fault.  If I change the user agent in Safari, things work as expected.