Developing with Output and Forms Services in AEM Forms

Using Output and Forms Service API in AEM Forms

In this article we will take a look at the following

Output Service - Typically this service is used to merge xml data with xdp template or pdf to generate flattened pdf. For more details, please refer to thejavadoc for the Output service.
FormsService - This is a very versatile service which allows you to export/import data from and into PDF file. For more details, please refer to the javadoc for the the Forms service.

The following code snippet exports data from PDF file

javax.servlet.http.Part pdfPart = request.getPart("pdffile");
String filePath = request.getParameter("saveLocation");
java.io.InputStream pdfIS = pdfPart.getInputStream();
com.adobe.aemfd.docmanager.Document pdfDocument = new com.adobe.aemfd.docmanager.Document(pdfIS);
com.adobe.fd.forms.api.FormsService formsservice = sling.getService(com.adobe.fd.forms.api.FormsService.class);
com.adobe.aemfd.docmanager.Document xmlDocument = formsservice.exportData(pdfDocument,com.adobe.fd.forms.api.DataFormat.Auto);

Line 1 extracts pdffile from the request

Line2 extracts the saveLocation from the request

Line 5 gets hold of FormsService

Line 6 exports the xmlData from the PDF File

To test the sample package on your system

Download and install the package using the AEM package manager

After you install the package you will have to allowlist the following URLs in Adobe Granite CSRF Filter.

Please follow the steps mentioned below to allowlist the paths mentioned above.
Login to configMgr
Search for Adobe Granite CSRF Filter
Add the following 3 paths in the excluded sections and save
/content/AemFormsSamples/mergedata
/content/AemFormsSamples/exportdata
/content/AemFormsSamples/outputservice
Search for “Sling Referrer filter”
Check the “Allow Empty” check box. (This setting should be for testing purposes only)
There are a number of ways to test the sample code. The quickest and easiest is to use Postman app. Postman allows you to make POST requests to your server. Install Postman app on your system.
Launch the app and enter the following URL to test the export data API

Make sure you have selected “POST” from the drop down list
http://localhost:4502/content/AemFormsSamples/exportdata.html
Make sure you specify “Authorization” as “Basic Auth”. Specify the AEM Server username and password
Navigate to the “Body” tab and specify the request parameters as shown in the image below
export
Then click the Send button

The package contains 3 samples. The following paragraphs explain when to use the output service or Forms Service, the url of the service ,input parameters that each service expects

Merge Data and Flatten Output

Use Output Service to merge data with xdp or pdf document to generate flattened pdf
POST URL: http://localhost:4502/content/AemFormsSamples/outputservice.html
Request Parameters -
- xdp_or_pdf_file : The xdp or pdf file that you want to merge data with
- xmlfile: The xml data file that will be merged with xdp_or_pdf_file
- saveLocation: The location to save the rendered document on your file system. For example c:\documents\sample.pdf

Import Data into PDF File

Use FormsService to import data into PDF file
POST URL - http://localhost:4502/content/AemFormsSamples/mergedata.html
Request Parameters:
- pdffile : The pdf file that you want to merge data with
- xmlfile: The xml data file that will be merged with pdf file
- saveLocation: The location to save the rendered document on your file system. For example c:\outputsample.pdf.

Export Data from PDF File

Use FormsService to export data from PDF File
POST URL - http://localhost:4502/content/AemFormsSamples/exportdata.html
Request Parameters:
- pdffile : The pdf file that you want to export data from
- saveLocation: The location to save the exported data on your file system. For example c:\documents\exported_data.xml