PDF forms and FDF Data vs HTML Forms

[boilermaker73]

Given all the communities listed and being unable to find a general discussion forum on Acrobat PDF forms, I hope this is the correct forum for this post.

As one who is very passionate when it comes to PDF forms technology (namely, PDF forms designed/developed in Acrobat) and the many advantages interactive PDF forms have to offer more than 20-years after Acrobat first debuted back in 1993, I am somewhat distraught and disillusioned at what seems to be a trend to collect/retrieve data online using HTML forms in what appears to be an attempt to replace the use of PDF forms and FDF data. I also continue to be taken aback by the number of websites (in both the public and private business sectors) that rely on static (read-only) PDF forms that require their clients/customers/patients to download, print, and manually fill-in their application, order forms by hand not to mention websites that provided dynamic interactive PDF forms that fail to comply with acceptable form field naming conventions not to mention the lack of formatted date, phone, zip code fields, or scripts capable of adding a slew of form feature enhancements to facilitate completion of the form using the Free Adobe Reader. To me, this is no different than those in the private and public sectors who seem to be stuck using dated/dinosaur technology like fax machines that should have been relegated to the nearest dump site 20 years ago. Sorry for the rant but am I missing something or am I to believe that HTML forms are the new wave to replace PDF forms and FDF form data for collecting information online? I for one would like to believe that the recent trend has more to do with marketing, lack of knowledge and education among corporate and government entities, and budget restraints resulting in more and more website owners being persuaded to choose HTML to collect/retrieve form data on their site when in essence HTML cannot begin to hold a candle to PDF forms and FDF Data. What say you? Thank you ahead of time.

[ls_rbls]

Interesting! 

I haven't even noticed all of these observations until I read this post.

From reading a few things here and there, I can see a tendency of users in general becoming more inclined to doing everything from a web browser.

That could be good and bad.

Just like fax is still in use even though the selling of fax machines was discontinued probably about two years ago?

But then you have a bunch of  self-proclaimed "secured" mobile apps that send fax via encrypted radio links from your wireless phone device via Cloud data-networks.

Needless to say, that HTML may not be needed anymore for the purpose of just collecting data... our cell phones are already doing all of that 24 hours a day and 7 days a week, 365 days per year.

Our voice and face recognition, for example. Interacting with artificial intelligence software that can predict our choices, apps and services that can pinpoint our exact physical location, our travels, our medical information, what we talk over the phone, what we text to others, what we post on these forums,  what websites do we visit exactly (and how long we stay and view certain pages in those websites that we visit), our demograpgics, and the list goes on, and on...

Maybe the next thing is our mobile devices will soon start collecting our thoughts too without our explicit consent... who knows, right?

[JR Boulay]

It has become very difficult to use PDF forms online since the AdobePDF plugin is no longer supported by browsers, which do not or poorly support AcroForms functions.

However, nothing can replace PDF for offline forms.