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August 21, 2025
Answered

Wanting to prompt user to open form in Adobe Reader

  • August 21, 2025
  • 1 reply
  • 204 views

I recently made a post that some forms I made in Acrobat which are being used by the public are not conforming to the rules I set when creating the forms, such as only allowing text in a box to go to the length of the box (no scroll). Also, some forms I've received have entered text which is duplicating over itself and text continuing past the width of the box instead of entering onto a new line.

 

A few people on that post had replied to say that this is most likely because the people using the form were using a PDF reader which did not recognise the restrictions I added to the form.

 

It was suggested that I edit the file so that users are prompted to open the file in Adobe Reader. How do I do this?

 

If there are other solutions for how to fix these issues, I'd love to here them.

Correct answer Thom Parker

Here's one technique:

https://www.pdfscripting.com/public/Lite-Document-Security-Description.cfm

 

The message is displayed to the user by default, and removed with a document level script. If the PDF is opened on a viewer that doesn't support JavaScript, then all they see is the message. But if it's opened on a viewer that does support JavaScript, then the message is removed.   For a form I set it up to hide all the fields by default, and then the script sets the fields to visible. 

Contact me if you'd like to hire a programmer to setup the PDF using this technique. 

 

 

1 reply

Thom Parker
Community Expert
Thom ParkerCommunity ExpertCorrect answer
Community Expert
August 21, 2025

Here's one technique:

https://www.pdfscripting.com/public/Lite-Document-Security-Description.cfm

 

The message is displayed to the user by default, and removed with a document level script. If the PDF is opened on a viewer that doesn't support JavaScript, then all they see is the message. But if it's opened on a viewer that does support JavaScript, then the message is removed.   For a form I set it up to hide all the fields by default, and then the script sets the fields to visible. 

Contact me if you'd like to hire a programmer to setup the PDF using this technique. 

 

 

Thom Parker - Software Developer at PDFScriptingUse the Acrobat JavaScript Reference early and often