Participant

Question

Fillable Saveable Form - Fields appear to be blank but aren't

Forum|Forum|16 years ago
February 28, 2009
26 replies
234242 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 and it the form appears initially to be blank unless you click into the field - you can then see the data. However, you can't print the form with the data displayed. If using Reader version 8, then 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?

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A

Anonymous

I have had the same problem, using OSX 10.9.3 and Adobe Professional 8.3.1 I "optimized" the form (Advanced / PDF Optimizer / Standard) it seems to work now...

A

Anonymous

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A

AndrewJW1313

Participant

I have been experiencing the same issue.

Here are the details of my form:

Created form in Acrobat X on Mac
Form includes calculation fields
Field font set to Arial as it is common on 99.9999999% of ALL machines
Password protected from changes

Here are issues with my form:

When completed in Acrobat or Reader and submitted, everything appears fine
When completed by Mac users within Preview the calculation fields are not calculated as the calculation script is removed and many properties assigned to text fields are erased/ignored
Some Reader/Acrobat users systems erases the font property
The latter two bullets result in a "blank" form being submitted unless I click within each field and then I can see the data, but I cannot print - here's something fun for you, regardless of how it was submitted, I can open and see everything in Preview AND when opened in any previous version of Acrobat, such as version 8, but I cannot see anything without clicking the fields within Acrobat X

Here is only "resolution" to date:

Open the submitted form in Acrobat
Choose Form > Edit and select each field, right-click and choose properties
Change the font family to anything and voila, the data appears
If saved and submitted through Preview though, the calculation fields are blank and have to be reformatted to calculate data

Final thoughts (just like Jerry Springer's, these really don't matter):

Even though I password protected my document from editing, preview allowed for the formating of the fields to be overriden by Preview. By simply opening and saving a Password protected PDF in Preview and then opening in Acrobat, a user can have full control over editing your form

Since the simplest solution is to change the font family, Adobe should allow for a "default" font setting so that the form displays a default font on the users machine and then when opened on another, it will use a default font there, ensuring the data is always visible, accessible and printable.

I have seen one user within this thread defending Adobe, stating this isn't their fault and I can't agree with that totally. I have been an Adobe user for over 10 years, and ever since Acrobat 7, there have been known issues by Adobe and when contacted regarding the issues, it has been made very evident that Adobe would address the issue in the next release of the product, but not worry about a patch for existing customers. I'm sure there is something Adobe could do to offer support for this issue, but they haven't. In fact, the only "resolution" that has truly been offered for this problem was by a poster on this board.

Knowing that there are many users opening, completing and saving PDF fillable forms in Preview, Adobe should consider looking into this and developing some kind of patch.

G

George_Johnson

Inspiring

The calculated fields don't calculate in Preview because it doesn't support JavaScript in PDF forms. This also affects all other scripts that may be present, including those used to control keystrokes, formatting, and validation. Preview goes further when it corrupts the form by removing all scripting and digital signature fields. The list of things that Preview screws up is too long to get into here. There is absolutely nothing Adobe can do to reverse the extensive damage that Preview does.

Any sort of attempt by Adobe to simply fix the field appearance would be counterproductive in my opinion, as it would merely make it appear that the form is fixed when it is far from it. Simply masking the problem is no fix and can lead to unexpected and incorrect results and Acrobat/Reader should not automatically attempt it. If a user chooses to do this with one of the scripts that are available, that's a different matter, but they should be informed about the significant pitfalls of this approach.

There is a much easier way to deal with forms that have been corrupted by Preview than what you mentioned. You can use Acrobat to export the form data and import it into a blank form. This is far easier, and you don't end up with a form that is still corrupted as your method does.

Also, it is almost always a mistake to use Arial for a form field font. You should use Helvetica instead. Acrobat/Reader end up using a private version of Arial anyway, so selecting Arial only causes the file size to increase unnecessarily since the entire font must be embedded. Here are some links where this issue is discussed in more detail:

http://forums.adobe.com/thread/1109176

http://forums.adobe.com/thread/1276386

P

pritcharddesign

Inspiring

I have read this whole thread, and others. I am having this issue, receiving 'blank' forms. I created the form in Acrobat Pro XI on a Mac. I can not see entries in the form fields...when I click in them, when I change the font size, when I make the fields 'visible'... I have not been told what was used when filling in the forms, but I believe it is a Mac/PC issue, especially after reading this forum. It looks like above people have done the opposite: created forms on PC and gotten blank forms from people who filled it in on a Mac.

Since I'm on a Mac, I can't use Foxit. Also, as mentioned above, Adobe was originally created for Mac. Does anyone have a way I can read the form fields for Mac, not PC?

Thank you.

M

mcoastsports

Participant

I've have had online tournament entry forms in adobe, with submit buttons for a long time. I've had many people complain the buttons don't work, or I get the forms but the fields are blank. Or the fields are visible only when clicked.

My daughter has a Mac and while she could fill out the form, the buttons didn't work. Through trial and error we found out it was the Mac Previewer. Once it was turned off the form worked perfectly and submitted to me as they should. That was part of the problem. The other part was the forms coming to me blank. I found out the problem was usually the person had a really old version of adobe reader. Once upgraded the forms worked. I have extended my form to older versions but obviously not all the way back to the 90's. I still get the complaint from time to time--I think it's some version of a faux adobe reader taking over. Always I tell them to open the real program and open the file from there and upgrade if necessary. Or if all else fails save as a picture or just scan the form and send it and I can deal with it on my end. Limits printouts and data extraction but these problems are minor really.

E

earthcub

Participant

I didn't read thru the entire thread but found the solution that worked for me. I'll tell you some details about my forms first.

I created them in Acrobat Professional on Mac OSX 10.6.8
I can view them perfectly in Preview (OSX native app).
I can send them to others and they've been sent back and can still be read correctly in Preview but not in Acrobat Professional on Mac OSX.
The same forms cannot be viewed properly in Windows 7, Acrobat Reader.

What I did to fix the problem was open a returned and filled in form in Acrobat Professional and following many other suggestions, opened Forms > edit mode, select all, change the font size to 9 and close. Now everything is readable.

I believe the problem to be font metrics between operating systems. It seems that if the field is too small for the font size, the font simply can't display, after it's run between different operating systems. I fully tested this by recreating the pdf with a consistent font size 9, copied to Windows, filled out the form, sent it back to OSX and opened in Acrobat Pro on OSX and everything was visible and readable. Opened in Acrobat Reader on Windows 7,same.

I hope this helps.

A

Anonymous

We have had this issue for a while but have lived with it. Ours is a locked-down desktop environment so we are unable to use any of the workarounds offered on this forum using Professional and are limited to opening these "blank" forms with Reader. We have to extract the data from each field of our forms and copy it into our system - excruciating!!

We now have a note on our website and in the downloadable forms asking our customers to not fill them out with Apple devices, not very customer friendly when iPads etc are prevalent.

I have read it is not an Adobe issue but rather an Apple issue. To be honest I don't care where the fault lies, but Adobe need to be fixing this because it is their customers being affected. Other freeware PDF software gets around this issue so Adobe should as well.

Does anyone know if it is fixed with Reader XI?

T

Test Screen Name

Legend

No, because Reader isn't broken.

A

Anonymous

See that is just not helpful !!

I'll just remove Adobe Reader from 2000 desktops and replace it with a PDF freeware that does work then. DA

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AVTTCLC

Participant

We just ran into the same problem. The forms were we received back have "Mac OS X 10.6.8 Quartz PDFContext" as the PDF Producer. They were created using Acrobat Pro X, and we tried viewing them with both Acrobat and Reader X, and had the issue where all the fields show up blank until you click on it.

Changing the font size made the fields visible again, but this is a clumsy workaround at best, as the users who receive these forms don't have Acrobat, and I don't know of a way to refresh the fields in Reader.

I can't believe that this issue has been around for 3 years, across 4 different revisions of Acrobat and Reader, and it still hasn't been resolved!

G

George_Johnson

Inspiring

The script shown here will work with Reader: http://kb2.adobe.com/community/publishing/885/cpsid_88564.html

I don't expect Apple to fix this major problem with Preview any time soon. That is a long time that Apple has ignored this problem.

Acrobat and Reader's behavior is according to standard. It is not a problem with Acrobat or Reader, it is a problem with Apple and their application that creates corrupted documents.

M

Midimistro

Participant

To All Above:

If I am reading your posts correctly, you experienced the same problem I did. What happened is that the form data saved, but the application did not close correctly and/or save normally the last time the document was edited. In order to correct this, all you simply need to do is edit the text in the text field of the form. This means if you have a phone number in the form, add or take away ways to write down the number. As for Names, completely retype the name. For Description fields, simply add a phrase or two or delete any undesired text while editing. After doing this and clicking on a different field in the form, the text/data that was there but wasn't visible earlier will become visible and prinable again. Note: You may need Reader 9.1.2 in order to do this, as well as the document Assembly and Creation of Template Pages to be set as "Not Allowed" (set up from "Document">Security" and apply fields according to previously stated if you are the creator of the form; users already under the "Not Allowed"s should be able to fix the problem without being the creator by doing the what I first stated). If the above doesn't work, then I can't help. If I find time I will update this post.

PS-This problem was sovled by a high school junior who only experienced and solved the problem between 2:00pm and 3:00pm today (see post info above for date, post time is 2 hours later than seen)

Midimistro

A

Anonymous

I think most people here are having the same problem. That problem is:

Most completed PDF forms return fine,

however about 20% return with "blank" fields.

When clicking on these fields the data is visible...

until you click on another field, then it is hidden again.

I have found a couple of helpful things, which I will summarise:

The problem IS often caused by Mac OSX among other things (check doc properties: see attached).
The problem can be "fixed" by any method of altering the "blank" fields... resizing, changing font etc this is ONLY because it refreshes the field, the problem is NOT the font or the field size... its a problem with the compatibility of the returned form.
The Javascipt "fix" above is for Acrobat ONLY not reader, becauase the fields need to me "edited" to fix the issue.
Adobe needs to address this issue... It seems quite widespread.
There is no "proper solution" all solutions are just altering all those fields... a proper solution would mean you dont have to apply it for every faulty document... they would just work.

Lastly:

FOXIT is another free PDF reader that will read/print these PDFs easily, it's a pretty small application, I suugest you install it along side your acrobat and use it when you need...

There isnt really a need to get upset, your data is there and it's fine... just hidden by defult. Contact Adobe and pass on your issue, when they see how widespread it is, they will focus more attention on a fix.

I hope this helps.

Josh

~graffiti

Legend

Adobe creates forms that work with Adobe products. It's not their responsibility to make forms work in non-Adobe products.

A

Anonymous

Adobe could seek to help customers who are using their program however...

I wrote my comment to be helpful and clarify the situation... and your "helpful" comment was just to retort at something I said. You've made thousands of posts, I hope other posts of yours were more useful!

A

Anonymous

I hope that "fix" works for some, but my downloaded IRS tax form fields have a property of "visible" and I still don't get data in my printed form.

A

Anonymous

OK, the problem, in my case is that the IRS in their complete lack of wisdom set entered text to be blue. Of course, my printer prints only black. There isn't a setting for grey scale or print as black, so it printed all but the colored text. I selected all fields and changed the color of the text to black. Problem solved (my wife figured this out @!$#%).

_

_DanielT

Participant

I HAVE THE PROPER SOLUTION!

I was having a problem with a PDF form that was filled with information, but not printing that information. I found another PDF form that did print information that was inside the form fields and compared the two forms in Acrobat 9 to find the solution. My goal was to make my PDF form savable AND printable. After opening your PDF form in Acrobat follow the steps below.

1. Click on Forms > Add or Edit Fields

2. Click on Edit > Select All.

3. Right click on one of the form fields and click on Properties

4. Click on the General tab (default tab)

5. Under Common Properties, change the Form Field drop down to Visible

6. Click Close

7. Click on Close Form Editing

8. Save

Note - You may be prompted to "Save as Copy" due to Extended Features, such as making your form savable via Abobe Reader. If so, go ahead and "Save as Copy," close the PDF, and start this process over using the copy. After you are done with the process above, then enable your Extended Features and Save.

More on making your form savable via Adobe Reader (Acrobat 9):

http://help.adobe.com/en_US/Acrobat/9.0/3D/WS58a04a822e3e50102bd615109794195ff-7e0d.w.html

More on making your form savable via Adobe Reader (Acrobat X Standard 10.1.4):

Go to Save as > Reader Extended PDF > Enable Forms Fill In and Save in Adobe Reader...

http://tv.adobe.com/watch/acrobat-x-tips-tricks/quick-tip-how-to-save-form-data-in-adobe-reader/