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Isabel28241038zsc0
Participant
February 3, 2023
Question

Fields blocked in signed PDF

  • February 3, 2023
  • 2 replies
  • 930 views

We are working on automating the reading and extraction of information from some forms in ".pdf". But we have encountered a limitation: when they are signed and printed as PDF (from the Print > Printer: Microsoft Print to PDF option), the fields are blocked and their content cannot be accessed. Is there a way to unlock these fields with a Pro or Advance license? Or to reverse that effect caused by printing as PDF?

This topic has been closed for replies.

2 replies

try67
Community Expert
try67Community Expert
Community Expert
February 5, 2023

This is a very bad way of extracting information from PDF forms, and it effectively removes the signatures too (if they are digital ones). Why are you doing it like that?

I
Isabel28241038zsc0Author
Participant
February 6, 2023

We are in a project and the PDFs have already been delivered. We cannot request that they not be printed, nor can we request the information again. As Test Screen Name said, when PDFs are printed, they are no longer forms.

That's why our idea is to read the PDFs line by line. But the filled in fields are locked as we said above.

Anyway, I am open to other suggestions or ideas to fix it.

Thanks again!

 

try67
Community Expert
try67Community Expert
Community Expert
February 6, 2023

If the text doesn't even copy correctly, then it's a font encoding issue, most likely.

There's no simple solution to this. You will need to re-create the files (export all pages to images; create a new PDF file from those images; run Text Recognition on the new file), and maybe then you'll be able to do it. The most likely culprit for this issue is MS's Print to PDF command.

T
Test Screen Name
Legend
February 3, 2023

When you print a form to PDF it isn't a form any more (if I understand you correctly). It's just a PDF page. The (one time) filled in fields are now just text on the page, not special in any way.  You basically need to instruct people not to do this, or be willing to re-key.

 

If you demand a signature many people will print-and-scan. This is even worse... 

I
Isabel28241038zsc0Author
Participant
February 3, 2023

We can access the text, line by line, to read it. That is not a problem. The problem is that the fields that people fill in cannot be copied. And therefore, they cannot be read either. The script returns something like this:

 

“Name: …………., addres:………….”

 

Any ideas to fix it? Thanks a lot!

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