Prerequisites

You require the following to use the Automated Forms Conversion Service (AFCS):

  • Automated Forms Conversion service (AFCS) is enabled for your organization
  • An Adobe ID account with administrator privileges for the conversion service
  • An up and running AEM 6.5 with the latest AEM Service Pack or AEM Forms as a Cloud Service author instance with the latest updates.
  • An AEM user (on your AEM instance) which is member of forms-user group

Set up the environment

Before using the service, prepare your AEM author instance to connect to the service running on Adobe Cloud. Perform the following steps in the listed sequence to prepare your instance for the service:

1. Download and install AEM 6.5 or onboard AEM Forms as a Cloud Service

Automated Forms Conversion service (AFCS) runs on AEM author instance. You require AEM 6.5 or AEM Forms as a Cloud Service to set up an AEM author instance.

2. (For AEM 6.5 only) Download and install AEM the latest Service Pack

Download and install the latest AEM Service Pack. For detailed instructions see AEM 6.5 Service Pack Release Notes.

3. (For AEM 6.5 only) Download and install AEM Forms add-on package

An AEM instance contains basic forms capabilities. The conversion service requires full capabilities of AEM Forms. Download and install AEM Forms add-on package to avail all the capabilities of AEM Forms. The package is required to set up and run the conversion service. For detailed instructions, see Install and configure data capture capabilities.
https://adminconsole.adobe.com/

NOTE
Ensure that you perform the mandatory post-installation configurations after installing the add-on package.

4. Create custom themes and templates

The reference packages contain sample themes and templates. Automated Forms Conversion service (AFCS) requires at least one theme and one template to convert a PDF form to an adaptive form. Create a custom theme and template of your own and point service configuration to use custom templates and themes before using the service.

You can also download and install the AEM Forms Reference Assets package on your Author instance. It creates some reference themes and template.

Configure Access and Permissions

Before you proceed to configure the service and connect your instance with the service running on Adobe Cloud, learn about the personas and privileges required to connect to the service. The service uses two different types of personas, administrators and developers:

  • Administrators: Administrators are responsible for managing Adobe software and services for their organization. Administrators grant access to developers in their organization to connect to Automated Forms Conversion service (AFCS) running on Adobe Cloud. When an administrator is provisioned for an organization, the administrator receives an email with title ‘You now have administrator rights to manage Adobe software and services for your organization’. If you are an administrator, check your mailbox for email with previously mentioned title and proceed to grant access to developers of your organization.

Admin access grant email

  • Developers: A developer connects an AEM Forms author instance to Automated Forms Conversion service (AFCS) running on Adobe Cloud. When an administrator grants rights to a developer to connect to Automated Forms Conversion service (AFCS), an email with title You now have developer access to manage Adobe API integrations for your organization is sent to the developer. If you are a developer, check your mailbox for email with previously mentioned title and proceed to Connect your local AEM instance to Automated Forms Conversion service on Adobe Cloud.

Developer access grant email

Grant access to developers of your organization

After Adobe enables access for your organization and provides required privileges to the administrator, the administrator can log into Admin Console (detailed instructions below), create a profile, and add developers to the profile. Developers can connect an instance of AEM Forms to Automated Forms Conversion service (AFCS) on Adobe Cloud.

Developers are members of your organization designated to run the conversion service. Only those developers which are added to Adobe Automated Forms Conversion service (AFCS) profile are entitled to use the Automated Forms Conversion service (AFCS).
Perform the below steps to create a profile and add developers to it. A minimum of one profile is required to grant required access to developers of your organization:

  1. Log in to Admin Console. Use Adobe ID of administrator provisioned to use Automated Forms Conversion service (AFCS) to login.

  2. Click the Automated Forms Conversion option.

  3. Click New Profile in the Products tab.

  4. Specify Name, Display Name, and Description for the profile. Click Done. For example, create a profile as AFC_Flamingo_Test_Dev.

    Specify details for the new profile.

  5. Add developer to the profile. To add the developers:

    1. In the Admin Console, navigate to the Overview tab.
    2. Click Assign Developers on the required product card.
    3. Enter the developers email address and, optionally, first and last names.
    4. Select product profiles. Click Save.

Repeat above steps for all the users. For more details about adding developers, see Manage developers.

Once an administrator adds developers to Adobe I/O profile, the developers are notified via email (if configured).

Add user to the forms-users group

Specify an email address in the profile of the AEM user designated to run the service. Ensure that the user is the member of the forms-users group. Emails are sent to the email address of user running the conversion. To specify an email address for the user and add user to the forms user group:

  1. Log in to your AEM Forms author instance as an AEM administrator. Use your local AEM credentials to login.

  2. Click Adobe Experience Manager > Tools > Security > Users.

  3. Select a user designated to run the conversion service and click Properties. The Edit User Settings page opens.

  4. Specify an email address in the Email field and click Save. The emails are sent to specified email address on successful completion or failure of the conversion.

    Specify Email

  5. Click the Groups tab. In the select group tab, type and select the forms-users group.

  6. Click Save & Close. The user is now a member of the forms-users group.

    Add Users Group

Connect your AEM Forms instance to Automated Forms Conversion service (AFCS) on Adobe Cloud

After an administrator provides you developer access, you can connect your AEM Forms instance to Automated Forms conversion service (AFCS) running on Adobe Cloud.
Perform the following steps, to connect AEM Forms instance to Automated Forms Conversion service:

1. Configure the service APIs on Adobe Developer Console

2. Create Adobe IMS configurations

3. Create Automated Forms Conversion Configuration