Work with form fields

Transcript

In this hands on tutorial, we’ll explore adding various types of form fields, setting form field properties, and adding security to create a high quality professional form. To follow along. Download and open the file title questionnaire.pdf in the tools pane select add under the repair form tool to include it in the right hand pane for easy access. Notice how you can create a form from an existing document like a Word or PDF, which we are doing directly from a scanner or start from scratch. Make sure form field auto detection is on and when you select start. Adobe Sensei automatically detects potential fields in the document forms. Edit mode is automatically enabled and the forms panel will open on the right. You can toggle in and out of forms edit mode using the keyboard shortcut a. If you have a single key accelerators turned on in your preferences, use a toolbar at the top to place different types of fields on your PDF from text fields to digital signatures. When you add fields, you’re really placing a layer on top of the form and not touching. what’s underneath. On the right are field alignment and sizing tools as well as a listing of all the fields on your form. Acrobat names the form field using the text that’s adjacent to the field. Next to the name is a visual indicator of the type of field. Now we’ve got a great head start on placing the form fields, but you should review the results in detail. First thing I’m going to do is fix the typo, which I can easily do by selecting the edit text and images tool. I can also resize the text box by dragging it to the left. We can switch back to form’s edit mode by choosing the select tool. An extra field was added at the top, which we can remove by selecting and hitting the delete key. The other fields look pretty good. We can double check by selecting preview or using the keyboard accelerator. Notice how the radio buttons act as a group where you can select one and only one choice, which is what we want. And the opposite is true of the checkboxes, which is also what we want. Instead of a text field for the headquarter location. We’ll add a list box. Adding specific list selections reduces the possibility of mistakes in the data you receive back. Use a toolbar at the top to add the list box field or by right clicking and choosing list box. The cursor will change into a large shadow crosshair with a box to help you accurately place the field. Next, select all properties. The options in this dialog change depending on what type of field you have created. Move over to the options tab to enter the dropdown choices at each item and when you’re finished, select the one that you want to be the default. We’ll close this dialog and select another form field to match the size by holding down the shift key and then selecting another field. The darker blue color denotes the anchor field, which is the field that our dropdown will resize to. We’ll match the height and width in the right hand pane and you can use the up arrow and down arrow to nudge the field to align with the line. Next, lets delete the text fields for the project timeline. Instead, we’ll use date picker fields so it’s easier for anyone filling out the form. Will name the field project start and when I select the properties under the format tab, choose the date format that you want to use. Once you choose the date format, you can preview what it will look like. Flow hold down control, shift or command shift on the Mac. To duplicate the field, we’ll need to give the new field a unique name because if you don’t give each foreign field a unique name, any data that’s entered into the field will repeat in each field that has the same name. This can be useful like when you don’t want whoever is filling out the form to constantly enter the same information. But it’s not what we need here. Then we’ll match the height and width in a line. Again, you can nudge up and down again using the arrow keys to align both fields to select the field above, to align it with. Now, finally at the bottom, double click to select a referral called Field to open the properties, Select the Options tab. And here we can change this field so that it precisely aligns each field entry using the comb option. The column option is only available when no other checkbox is selected will choose five because I know that each referral code is only five digits. If you choose a color underneath the appearance tab, each field will be separated with a line. Let’s close this dialog and use a keyboard accelerator. P to preview will enter some data here. We’ll exit preview mode using the keyboard accelerator P and then to remove the data select clear form from a more dropdown in the right hand pane.

Transcript

The final three things we’ll do with this form is to make sure all the text fields are consistent and professional. Check the tab, order and set security. Let’s start by selecting all the text fields on the right. You can do this by holding down the control key and selecting just the text fields. And then right click and select properties under the appearance tab, you can set the exact same font properties for all the fields at the same time. We’ll go ahead and set the font size for all the text fields to 12. The tab order, which is the order of form filler moves from field to field is determined by the order of the fields in the right hand pane to see the current order. You can select shift n and the numbers on each field will indicate the tab order. The new fields that we added are out of order. So to fix this, simply drag and drop the fields to the correct location in the right hand pane. Finally will secure this form so nobody can accidentally modify the fields or content of a document. Easiest way to do this is to use a keyboard, shortcut control d and select the security tab. Will choose password security and under the permissions area check restrict editing and printing of the document. We’re going to allow printing, but under changes allowed select fill in form fields and signing existing signature fields. Be sure to enter a strong password and confirm the password. Be sure to store the password using a method that’s easy to retrieve. In fact, we recommend keeping a version of your PDF file that’s not secured just in case you need to edit the form in the future. This Hands on tutorial was designed to highlight the numerous ways you can create professional PDF forms that accurately capture data from your end users.