How to create a fillable form on adobe, but save it as a word document where the blue fields show?

[Zack34644944vglo]

Hello,

I am new to adobe, and am finding it very confusing and frustrating.

In an attempt to try and learn the program, and get some work done at the same time..

I am trying to create a fillable "letter" on Adobe, but then save it as a Word Document where the blue fillable fields still show? I believe that is what I need to do?

I have a thank you letter typed out,  after I pressed "prepare form". On top of letter, I entered a date field and a blue fillable field is placed.

Under, I have "Dear" written and placed a text field next to it for the recipients name.

So it looks like:

*Date Field*

Dear *Text Field"

body of letter here, etc etc.

--

This is supposed to be a template for our office of a thank you letter we send to our customers after our services are rendered. Where they can just re-enter the date and name and reuse it over and over again.

I need to send it to my secretarys computer, whom does not have an Adobe Subscription. I have it on my personal account/computer though, the business does not.

So when I save it to my computer as an adobe pdf, just a normal pdf, and then go into my local computer files and re open it, it opens fine and the blue fields show. When I save/export it as a Word DocX, and open that one, it opens in word but the blue boxes are not visable or there in the first place. You can just type where the boxes are as if it was a normal word document.

When it comes to all the adobe settings and document properties and what not, I am completely lost, it is super overwhelming.

I just want to create this document so when I send it to people, or in this case my secretary, and they save it to their computer and open it, the blue fillable fileds show and the date field works, and she can select the date and it will automatically fill it out in the format I chose in properties. 

Of course I could just use a normal word document and erease the name and date and do it that way, but in an attempt to try and learn Adobe more, I would really love to figure this out.

I dont think I could send it as a pdf or adobe pdf to her computer because wouldnt she need an adobe subscription to see the blue fields and use them?

Side note: Is there even a difference between a pdf and an "Adobe PDF", which is what it says when you press "save as" on adobe?

[gary_sc]

Hi, @Zack34644944vglo, I'm sorry, but that's not the way this works. If you want a form in Word, create it in Word. It will not have "blue" fields for folks to fill in, and as they fill it in, there will be word-wrapping for all of the content following. 

There are many, many YouTube videos showing how to convert a Word document into a PDF document. Since different videos appeal to different levels of users, I'm apprehensive to point you to any one of them. 

But, the bottom line is that what you want is not possible with Acrobat because those blue fields are not transferrable to other applications. 

Oh, a PDF is a "Portable Document Format file. A number of years ago, Adobe released the rights to control that format to an ISO organization. Since then, anyone and their family can create PDFs, but not all are created equally. Some are better than others. All ARE PDFs, but not all contain the full range or properties and capabilities of an Adobe PDF. However, for most users, these differences are negligible. 

[Zack34644944vglo]

Hello thanks for your response. I didnt know that if you made fillable form on adobe, and converted it to Word, the fillable fields would not transfer over. I was wondering why that wasn't working. 

My problem isn't converting a word document into a pdf, that's easy to do through adobe or any online file converter.

My issue was when making and preparing the form on adobe, when I emailed it to our secretary and she opened it, the fields weren't showing. 

Also when I open the form on adobe the blue fields dont show until I go to the prepare form tool. Then, when I exit prepare form the blue fields disappear again. 

[Zack34644944vglo]

when sending to secretary, it was sent as PDF, not word document. I have tried both ways. The reason word wasn't showing them, has been answered. But not pdf

[PDF Automation Station]

"when I emailed it to our secretary and she opened it, the fields weren't showing"  I think you might be confusing field highlighting with actual fields.  The highlighting can be any color but the default is blue.  It can turned on or off by pressing Ctrl + k in Adobe, going to the Forms category, and selecting or unselecting "Show border hover color for fields".  Did the secretary not see the "blue" fields, or were there no fields? If highlighting is "off" (my preference) you can't see the fields but they are still there and they still work. Which PDF viewer did she open the document with?

[PDF Automation Station]

In addition to what @gary_sc has told you, why not have your secretary use the PDF fillable form?  She does not need a subscription.  It will work with free Adobe Reader, and probably any other desktop PDF viewer.

[try67]

I think you meant to write: She does not need a subscription.

[PDF Automation Station]

Yes.  Thank you for the correction.