Importing Data to Form Fields

[JMFreeman]

I hope this isn't already addressed on the forum, but I was unable to find a post close enough to what I'm trying to do to get me there.

I am working on making a PDF for field work, to be used on a tablet. Users will input a structure number in a field, and other fields will populate accordingly from a dataset (which I currently have in Excel). For portability and reusability, I want to store the data from Excel directly in the PDF file. There are only about 600 structures in the spreadsheet with only 32 values for each (lots of blanks too), so not a huge amount of data. When I say directly, I imagine exporting the Excel file to a .txt, then pasting it directly into a script. I'm trying to avoid the need to have multiple files handy or to have to import data each time a new structure is being inspected.

I have seen posts for dropdown selections where a field has if statements checking the contents of a dropdown input. The only problem I have is creating 600+ if statements... I know this is a simple thing I just don't have the tools for yet. I basically want the Acrobat Javascript equivalent of VLOOKUP from Excel.

Help, please!

Thanks,

JM

[Bernd Alheit]

What OS on the tablet?

[JMFreeman]

iOS

[Bernd Alheit]

Javascript in Acrobat Reader for iOS is very restricted.

[JMFreeman]

Well if necessary we could get any available app for the iPads. Free would be best, but if I need a pro version of something, that's possible.

[Bernd Alheit]

You can try the PDF Expert.

[JMFreeman]

Great, we have that one downloaded.

Now with that esatblished, can you help me make the PDF do what I need it to?

[Bernd Alheit]

I don't know what is possible in PDF Expert.

[JMFreeman]

I feel like I should repost and start over...

I want to know how to use data in a CSV file I have attached to a PDF. I want the user to enter a number in a field, which will be a number in the first column of data in the attached CSV, then I want other fields to automatically populate with data from the correct row and corresponding columns of the attached CSV. I need help writing the Javascript code to make this happen. I am using Adobe Acrobat Pro DC on a PC. I will worry about functionality on the iPad once I have the PDF working how I need it to.

[JMFreeman]

I have also found in my searching that attaching the data in a CSV is likely the way I should go. I just need to make sure that will be compatible in a PDF viewer for iPad. Plus I then have to figure out how to work with the attached CSV... 😅

[try67]

I've developed a (paid-for) tool that allows you to set it up very easily, based on a spreadsheet, and it even has an option to do it in a way that works in PDF Expert! You can find it here: http://try67.blogspot.com/2015/07/acrobat-populate-fields-from-dropdown.html