InDesign not honouring layer order when exporting to interactive pdf

[arnoenzo]

I made an interactive document with a stack of layers some time ago.
Interactive pdf works like a charm.
Today I needed to make some adjustments in the file, an addition to one of the bottom layers. The InDesign document shows correctly, but when exporting the file to interactive pdf, the layer order is not honoured. The button I added in the bottom layer (while behaving correctly in the InDesign document) is now on top of the stack, and the on-tap/on-release with button visibility is not properly working. Layer is set to be(come) invisible/not show when clicking a certain button, but it shows anyway.

Happens both on Windows and Mac, InDesign 17 x64.

Any pointers on what may be happening? I remember I've had this before in an older version, and I had to cut/paste-in-place all the objects again in the order I wanted/needed them to appear, but this document has grown so large, it would take me days to do that.

[Laubender]

Rule 1 with interactive elements like buttons :

They are always on top of the visible stack of elements when the PDF is opened with e.g. Acrobat Pro or Adobe Reader.

Can you share a screenshot of your page in InDesign with the Layers panel open and the button visible there and also a screenshot of the PDF open in Adobe Reader?

FWIW: If you want to obscure parts of your button you need another button without any functionality stacked above it.

Well, I hope you know, that the active area of a button is always a rectangular area. It does not matter what the shape of the object in a state is. If you want a different active area you have to work around it with tiny buttons where all rectangular areas of all the tiny buttons shape a non-rectangular area.

Thanks,
Uwe Laubender

( ACP )

[arnoenzo]

Hi Uwe,
I'm at a different computer right now, will send screenshots later today to illustrate the problem.

[arnoenzo]

Hi Uwe,
See below the screenshots.

These are all the layers, basic content (without any buttons) is the bottom layer.

This is the overview with all objects on all layers selected (see all the buttons are squares and are covering the text(s) with a large margin). I blurred privacy sensitive content, those are obviously not buttons.

This is the overlay that is activated when one of the buttons (orange layer) is pressed.

This is the action on the button. They are all the same for all orange buttons.

This is the screenshot of what it looks like in Acrobat. It is the only "Lees meer" on which the overlay is not working.
In a previous version of the document I had something else there, and the "Lees meer" worked perfectly fine. I needed to update the document, so I deleted the something else, and placed a new textbox with a new "Lees meer" button, and now it seems to no longer be affected by the overlay layer which is above it.

[Sarah25895631rw4t]

Arneonzo,

Did you ever figure out why Indesign wasn't honoring your layers? I'm having a very similar issue. I have simple buttons with a rollover effect. I just added a layer ON TOP of the buttons with a simple icon, which needs to show on top of the button, regardless of what the button is doing.  Once it's exported to an interactive PDF, that icon layer hides under the button. Screen shots are attached. Any ideas? 

[Derek Cross]

See my answer regarding buttons and Interactive PDFs.

[Derek Cross]

Regarding buttons in an Interactive PDF, 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

[Laubender]

@Sarah25895631rw4t said:

"Did you ever figure out why Indesign wasn't honoring your layers? I'm having a very similar issue. I have simple buttons with a rollover effect. I just added a layer ON TOP of the buttons with a simple icon, which needs to show on top of the button, regardless of what the button is doing.  Once it's exported to an interactive PDF, that icon layer hides under the button. Screen shots are attached. Any ideas?"

Hi Sarah,

if you want a simple icon on top of all other interactive elements it must be an interactive element on itself and positioned on top of all other interactive elements. Imagine all interactive elements as a special "layer" on top of all other non-interactive elements with an interactive PDF. That's the reason why you can exchange PDF contents of a page that is not interactive in Acrobat Pro with other PDF non-interactive contents of another page where all the interactive elements of the target page remain.

Practically you convert the icon to a non-functional button that when clicked in the exported interactive PDF leads to no action at all.

Regards,
Uwe Laubender
( Adobe Community Expert )