Calculated fields stop working

[Debbie Morris]

I have a form that we've been using for about 8 years. I recently made some changes to it and now my calculated fields have a mind of their own.

I have six separate pages, five with individual totals, which are then added together on the sixth page. After receiving a report that the totals weren't working, I went in and updated all of my calculations and tested, and everything works fine. Once I close Acrobat and go back in, however, there are only two calculated fields on the sixth page that still work. After saving the form but before restarting Acrobat, I see all 12 of my calculated fields when I go in to 'Set Field Calculation Order'. After restarting Acrobat, I only see 2. I've tried adding them using the 'Value is the sum (+) option', as well as adding them all individually with the simplified field notation. The same problem happens either way. Any ideas what I'm doing wrong? 

Calculated Fields, after saving but before restarting Acrobat:

Testing the form, before restarting Acrobat:

After restarting Acrobat:

Thanks,

Debbie

[Thom Parker]

Without seeing the form I can't be sure, but it looks like the internal AcroForm structure has been corrupted. This happens occasionally when forms are edited a lot, or sometimes when old forms are edited in newer versions.  I think the newer Acrobat version might be choking on some detail in the old forms, which prevents it from properly updating the AcroForm key, but that's just speculation.

To get to the point, the only real solution is to recreate the PDF and copy over the old fields.   

[Debbie Morris]

Thanks, Thom. I was finally able to get it working by using Foxit on it. I simply opened the form, and then went into view the Calculate tab for each of the fields (which I also did previously in Acrobat, but it didn't seem to make a difference there).

Now that I have it working, I'll make a copy tomorrow and see if editing the form in Acrobat still continues to break it or, if simply updating it with another editor was enough to fix whatever issues there were behind the scenes.

Thanks,

Debbie

[Thom Parker]

ha ha, that's pretty interesting. Seems like Foxit might have rebuilt the internal structure. 

Good Trick!!