Custom Tools

[nigelh66273629]

Can anyone explain the utility of creating a custom tool?

I notice there is an exchange for tools on adobe, but the only tools there are about 2-3 years old and apparently they are incompatible with DC.

There does not seem to be any explanation anywhere in adobe literature on it and nothing when I google.

I suspect it is just a waste of space, but if someone knows what it's about then interested to hear.

[Thom Parker]

There are many different types of custom tools that are created for Acrobat, such as Actions, Automation Scripts, plug-ins.  And they can do just about any kind of customized document processing you need.

For example, building and splitting documents, creating bookmarks, extracting data, watermarking, etc. The list of activities you can automate is endless.  You'll find lots of pre-built tools, some free and some for sale. Or you can learn to program and write your own.

As far as the exchange tools, if you are talking about the exchange at www.acrobatuser.com, that site has been static for a few years. As such, many of the Actions were built on previous versions. But I believe that all of them still operate in Acrobat DC. Read some of the descriptions to get an idea of the kinds of things you can do with an Action.

[gkaiseril]

The Acrobat SDK documentation has at least one section devoted to Actions or Batch Sequences and also one for Plug-ins.

You might also want to acquaint yourself with the MDN JavaScript material.