Signing a PDF on a website does not work

[Pierre5D55]

I am having problems with an interactive form I made recently with Adobe Actobat DC.

First of all, I would really love to enable people to sign it with an uploaded signature image or (on mobile) a scribbled signature. Making a certified digital signature the way Acrobat DC requires it just makes it more difficult in stead of easier for people to sign the form.

But then, signing the form digitally does not even work online so it is a useless feature. I tried this with Microsoft Edge, Firefox or Chrome (all latest versions). Is it even possible to enable signing a form on a website or should we go back to the old days, when you had to print the form, sign it with a pen, scan it and then send it as an attachment???

[ls_rbls]

You need to use Adobe Sign for this type of workflow.

[Pierre5D55]

Which means that it can not be made user friendly and accessible via the website, because it requires a complete change of workflow in which I need the e-mail addresses in advance of people that are possibly going to fill out the form. It will be easier then to instruct people to download the form and fill it out on their own computer. Or else, to not use pdf and create an online form in html and Javascript.  

[MeenakshiNegi]

Hi there,

Thank you for reaching out.

++ Adding to the above suggestion.

In Adobe Sign, you can create a form that can be available on the website using the feature called Web form. It doesn't require the email addresses of the signers or people who will be filling that form. You can simply add form fields and signature fields on the document. Then upload it on your website. 

For more information about the feature, please refer to this help link: https://helpx.adobe.com/sign/using/web-forms.html

The feature Web form is available with Adobe Sign small business, business, and enterprise service plan.

As you wish to enable the people to sign it with an uploaded signature image or (on mobile) a scribbled signature, you can simply leave a blank space for the field. People can use the Fill & Sign tool in Acrobat/ Reader (for mobile or desktop) to add a signature (image or scribbled). Check if that works for you.

Hope the information helps.

Let us know if you have any questions.

Thanks,

Meenakshi

[ls_rbls]

Thank you for clarifying Meenakshi.

[Pierre5D55]

Does this mean I have to make a new web form? I do not see any options to save of export the interactieve pdf form to a web form. 

[ls_rbls]

See this tutorial:

Publish a Webform 

Go online and follow the steps in that link.

All you have to do is make a copy of the PDF that you already created and basically turn it into a template that you can reuse with different workflows.

The most important detail is that this feature is not available with an individual plan..

If you determine that you can't or won't pay for such plan at this time then you'll have to publish the PDF as a webform following this other guidance:

https://helpx.adobe.com/acrobat/using/publishing-interactive-pdf-web-forms.html 

[Test Screen Name]

You need to know that Edge, Firefox and Chrome all use their own PDF viewing software. Three different ones, made by Edge, Firefox and Google. They blocked Acrobat Reader years ago. So there's nothing Adobe can do to make signing work online within these browsers, except to set up an online service like Adobe Sign. 

[ls_rbls]

Unless I misunderstood you completely I don't know what you're complaining about.

Uploading an image of a signature or creating a wet signature on mobile is not how you used certificate based digital signatures.

It seems like you're confusing electronic signatures with certificate based digital signatures.

Browsers like the ones you've mentioned, provide the ability to use certificate based digital certificate ID authentication mechanism.

And no, public and private key encryptions, hashing algorithms, how to set this up is not user friendly. But that is an International ISO standard, not an Adobe Acrobat standard.

Besides, the problem is not on the Adobe Sign platform.

Looks more to me that the problem is on the subpar performance of web browsers to view and work with PDFs in general.

I wouldn't have recommended the Adobe Sign  workflow if it wasn't user friendly. 

The hardest part is not for the users, but maybe in what is required from them to obtain a digital certificate from a trusted certificate authority provider in order to  uniquely identfy each signer to that certificate.

Again, this is an International industry standard as defined in the Request For Comments published and constantly revised by the Internet Society.

If applying a finger signature, signing with a stamp image, or a wet electronic signature is what you were referring to, then it should be even easier to use with Adobe Sign.

You cannot use these methods on a signing field that is meant for certificate based signature.

And embedding an Adobe Sign form to your existing website is not the same as developing and entire CGI script that will reside in a web server (not embedded inside an Acrobat form),  to interface with the same field objects of the PDF that a user must fill in. That is double the work to achieve such workflow.

If you insist that that is the route you believe is the way to go, the user must also need Adobe REader or Acrobat, and if you're employing digital certificate-based signature , or even self-signed digital certificates in this workflow; you'll only be able to use the default Adobe timestamp server or the one you select as default with your organization to authenticate the signing actions at signing time.

You cannot use or have the ability to configure more than one timestamp server to use simultaneously.

With Adobe Sign you can indeed provide the users with more than one timestamp server , which supports environments where a user has multi-approving or reviewing roles.

But maybe you're right.

Perhaps you can point where in the Adobe Sign guidance it says it doesn't supports the methods you're describing.