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_Tricia_Tate_
New Participant
February 28, 2009
Question

PDF Fillable Form -data in fields disappear

  • February 28, 2009
  • 6 replies
  • 111431 views
We have a fillable savable form created with Adobe Acrobat 8 Professional. Sometimes the form emailed back to our office and opened in Reader Version 9 appears initially to have blank fields unless you click into the field - you can then see the data. However, you can't print the form with the data displayed and the data seems to disappear when you click to the next field. If using Reader version 8, and if you click the highlight button it acts like a toggle switch to view the data in the fields; however you still can't print.

Any ideas on what is causing this and how we can fix it?
    This topic has been closed for replies.

    6 replies

    N
    nmg223
    New Participant
    January 12, 2020

    Hi, I think this occurs when the initial user fills out the form using a MAC. Any way the easiest and quickest solution I found was to convert it back to a word document and save it, then covert it back to a PDF and all data will be visible and availble. Hope this helps. 

    Natalie 

    B
    blampyre
    New Participant
    November 12, 2010

    I am having the same problem.  A form created in Acrobat 9 Pro and posted on our website for people to download, complete and email back.  Sometimes they are fine.  Others come back looking blank, with the boxes 'blued out'.  If you click on a field, the data appears in that field only.  When you click on another field, the data in the first diappears, and the clicked one appears.

    Because this seems to work in some cases and not others, I wonder if it might have anything to do with the version of Acrobat the user has.

    Having bought Acrobat 9 Pro just so that I could do this, I would love to find a solution.

    G
    George_Johnson
    Inspiring
    November 12, 2010

    The most likely cause was mentioned by Lori. For a recent topic with more information, see: http://forums.adobe.com/thread/750334?tstart=0

    Allta Media
    Allta Media
    Community Expert
    March 25, 2010

    It is possible that this is related to an issue with Acrobat Forms that are filled out on Mac OSX.  Apparently Mac OSX's Preview.app isn't writing any appearance into the form fields nor  it is setting the "needs appearance" flag within the PDF. Here is a link to a fix for the issue from Joel Geraci's blog at Script to Fix Mac OSX  Preview.app Form Fill and Save.

    I
    id1brok
    New Participant
    August 23, 2020

    Yesterday I completed a forty eight page questionaire for a client, the task took me four hours to complete on a windows ten OS. As a precaution, because some of the fields were complicated, I used the 'save' facility. After a break, I went to complete  the form. All the data had diasappeared. I tried the solutions suggested  - clicking on the field etcetera to no avail. I had to redo the whole form, which took another four hours; but this time I did not touch the 'save' button, completed the form in one session and printed it off. I was relieved that this time I was successful but very angry at the complete uselessness of Adobe, particularly as the form was from a government department and essential for my client's welfare.

    What did I do wrong?

    try67
    try67
    Community Expert
    August 23, 2020

    It doesn't sound like you did anything wrong, but it's very hard to say for sure without knowing what exact application you used, what version number, what file you filled-in, how you did it, etc.

    P
    perfect_friendship16B8
    New Participant
    February 17, 2010

    I found a fix for printing the data in the fields.  Using Acrobat 8 Professional I went to the field editing and selected all the fields and made them no fill. Some were white, some were none, but doing this made all of them visible and printable without losing the data.

      S
      strikeone92
      New Participant
      October 31, 2011

      thanks for the help chrispjd, solved my problem.

      B
      Bill12
      Inspiring
      October 20, 2009

      Can you post a sample? It may be that printing is not allowed. There was also a problem with viewing the fields in some versions of Acrobat. That was taken care of with updates I think.

      B
      Bill12
      Inspiring
      February 28, 2009
      To print the data select document & markup in the print box.
      C
      cfci
      New Participant
      October 6, 2009

      I am having the same problem, but in Acrobat Pro Extended and in Adobe Reader. When I print and select "Document and Markups," it only prints the documents and the check boxes (which do show on my screen).

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