Fillable Forms text box is blue - can I make them white?

[staceyleepd]

I've created a Fillable form using text boxes and it works well in the preview except that all of the text boxes are blue. I would like my users who are going to fill out the form to not see the blue text boxes; the text boxes should just look white/transparent (like nothing is there) until they put their cursor in the answer area.

Does anyone know how to edit/fix this? I'm not a proficient user of Adobe so I may be making newbie mistake!

Thanks.

[Tariq Dar · Accepted solution]

Hi Staceyleepd,

Text boxes are blue it is not a form property, it just a highlighting feature of Acrobat/Reader to give a user an idea those are fillable.

If you print the form they will turn out to be normal with white background. To check Launch Acrobat/Reader , click Edit>Preferences> Forms, Highlight color   "Fields highlight color." You can change the color and if you print the color doesn't have any impact. You can turn it off by un-checking the preferences  "Show border hover color for the fields. "  

Hope that answers your questions. Let us know if you have further questions.

Regards,
Tariq Dar.

[MattMcTap]

Tariq,

You are asking us to ask all our users to go and change their settings.

Changing the settings on my machine won't make it look good on the OPs.

I just spent an hour with someone on Adobe chat and literally the suggestion they had for me was to delete the text fields.

You can't change it, they'll always be blue, they'll always look horrible, Adobe know this and aren't going to fix it.

I promise you. You can't do it so you can distribute it out to people.

[try67]

You can easily do it. It's possible to embed a simple script in your file that will disable the fields highlighting in any computer it is opened on. The problem with doing that is that it will also apply for other files, which the user might not like, so it's a good idea of at least informing them (or better yet, ask for their permission) when doing it.

[MattMcTap]

This doesn't sound particularly desirable, especially if you are sending out files to clients.

[try67]

So what would be the desirable outcome in your eyes, exactly? You don't like the color, but you don't want to disable it... You can check if that option is turned on and if so present the user with a notification that for an optimal viewing experience they should disable it.

And there's more than one option. The user can enable or disable it, and they can change the highlight color to something else, if they wished to.

[DLoria]

What would be desireable is for the property of weather or not the fields are highlighted in blue was by default unique to the document and not determined by your reader settings.  That would would sove the problem.  Is this possible????

[try67]

What would be desireable is for the property of weather or not the fields are highlighted in blue was by default unique to the document and not determined by your reader settings.  That would would sove the problem.  Is this possible????

By @DLoria

I agree, but that's not the case. The best you can do it to embed a script in the file to change the global setting when the file is opened, and then change it back to its original value when it is closed.

However, any other file opened while your file is open will also be affected by this change.

[Kathy5FFA]

@try67 I am trying to remove the blue highlight globally for any user that opens the document. Could you please provide the script and instructions for how to do this? Thank you!

[try67]

The code is posted down this thread. You can place it under Tools - JavaScript - Document JavaScripts, but please read the full thread carefully! This change will affect all files the users opens, not just yours.

[Kathy5FFA]

@try67 Thanks so much! Is there any code to remove the blue highlights when the pdf is viewed in a browser by any chance? A lot of people have their pdfs default to open online.

[try67]

Nothing special for browsers, no. If the code posted above doesn't work then it's probably not possible. It will depend on the browser, of course.

[Kathy5FFA]

Ok, thank you for your help!

[Test Screen Name]

It’s a personal choice. That‘s why it’s a preference. Tell your users how to change it and if they share your dislike they can choose their own colour.

[MattMcTap]

It's not a choice if there is only one option.

[gkaiseril]

There are options to set the highlight and fill colors used as well as having the highlight fields on or off.

[The best man]

Its amazing i get exactly what youre sayign tand they dont. We want the option to create a form field without a blue highlight but has total functionbality. We want the decision on our end and if the user wants to see it they can choose that option.

[SadieBlue]

How hard would it be for them to let us edit the highlight color of form fields!? Problem solved.

[try67]

You can do it already, under Edit - Prefs. - Forms.

[SadieBlue]

That would only change the color for ME. I want to create a document that gets sent to many other people and the blue clashes with the overall pdf color. There is no way for me to make it orange and stay that way when other people open the document.

[try67]

It is possible to do it by embedding a script into your file that changes this setting, but I would strongly recommend against it, as it will also affect all other files the user opens.

The code to do it is this:

app.runtimeHighlightColor = color.red;

[pedroluzwally]

Hey, I've actually used this code but now I want to go back to it being the original blue. How can I do this? Thanks.

[try67]

Go back to the same location under Preferences and change it back.

The original color used is the third from the right on the bottom row of the colors table.

Or you can do it by running this script from the JS Console:

app.runtimeHighlightColor = ["RGB",0.666656494140625,0.75,1];

[DLoria]

whats the code to turn off the highlight all together "app.runtimeHighlightColor = false.;"????????

[try67 · Accepted solution]

No, it's this:

app.runtimeHighlight = false;