Buttons bounding box: black dotted outline/borders visible - Indesign interactive PDF in Acrobat

[Karlien5FAB]

Hi everyone,

I am experiencing this issue: when exporting my Indesign document as interactive PDF, the buttons and interactive elements works perfectly in Preview (Mac), but when the pdf is opened in Acrobat I get visible black dotted outlines/bounding box borders (i.e. the 'borders' of the buttons as set up in original Indesign file) in the interactive PDF. It is really annoying and I have tried many different iterations/settings in Indesign to troubleshoot, but every time it's the same - perfect (no borders, interactivity works 100%) in Preview on Mac, but when I open the file in Acrobat, the Buttons bounding box borders show up as dotted black outlines.

I need these borders to not be visible when random reader/viewers open the PDF on their computers (as I have no idea what pdf viewer they may have installed, or whether they have Mac (Preview) or Windows/Acrobat etc) - so I need the PDF to view correctly, without the dotted outline "bounding box" borders when opened on the majority of viewers' computers.

I am using Adobe Indesign 2022, and Adobe Acrobat Pro DC 2022 version.

Any help would be much appreciated!

Screenshot:

[Derek Cross]

Regarding buttons, you can have a word or words or an image (such as a button shape) as a document hyperlink to say another page in the document, or to an external website.
Some devices, for example, iPads, don't have rollover capability – only click – you should avoid multi-action buttons like On Click, On Roll Over, etc.  Multi-state objects (MSO) don’t work at all in Interactive PDFs.

[Bill Silbert]

I'm not seeing black outlined buttons in your screen shots. Also, could you be specific as to how you've created the buttons and how you've made your interactive pdfs. Also, please be aware that Interactive pdfs made with elements from the Buttons and Forms Panel are only guaranteed to be read acurately using Acrobat version 9 or above. If you are testing using an earlier version of Acrobat then that could be the source of your problem. As you said, the aim is to have your pdfs read acurately by as many pdf viewers as possible. Unfortunately by its very nature that is not really possible. I'm actually surprised that Mac's Preview is reading them. I have not always found that to be the case.

[Karlien5FAB]

Hi Bill,

thanks for the swift reply - I attached some more screenshots taken in Adobe Acrobat Pro  DC (2022).

The black border/dotted outlline only appears when I view the PDF in Acrobat, not in Preview (Mac), and it is only visible around images/buttons that are "Multi-state", i.e. different states for "Normal"/"Rollover"/ "Click". The interactiviy works in Preview and Acrobat, but the dotted outline/border is only visible in Acrobat.

I am using Adobe Indesign 2022 and Adobe Acrobat DC Pro (2022) - all updates and latest versions of all software installed, also using Preview (2022) on Mac OS 10.15.7 to test the interactive PDF.

I have also attached screenshots of my working InDesign file - where the "buttons" are set up, and you can see the "States" and bounding boxes/borders of the button boxes/states - these become the dotted black outline when exporting the Interactive PDF, and only shows up in Acrobat (not Preview). 

When I publish the exact same file online via Indesign's "Publish Online" function, then all the interactivity and all the buttons function 100% correctly, with no dotted outlines visible around interactive/Multi-state Objects.

Any suggestions would be very welcome, thanks so much for your time.

[Creamer Training]

Are you possibly seeing Acrobat's default Link Properties?

[Kimberly29338402tp7y]

The black dotted outline box that you are seeing is an Adobe Acrobat preferences setting (for each user). If you go to Edit > Preferences > Forms and uncheck the "Show Focus Rectangle" box, you will see that your issue resolves... However... That will only effect your Acrobat interface. The users you share the file with would also have to change their Preference settings in order not to see the black outlined box.