Buttons
The button controls enable you to provide the user with actions related to document navigation, data field resets, and form printing. In addition, the Submit button enables you to specify the URL of a server to which users can upload form data (in FDF or PDF format) when they have finished filling out the form.
Inserting a button
Insert a button in the fillable PDF form as follows:
1.Select Insert | Insert Form Controls | Button.
2.Click the location in the layout container where you wish to insert the button.
3.If you need to move the button for more precise placement, hover over the top or left edge of the button's layout box till the cursor turns into a crossed double-sided arrow. Then click and drag the layout box to the desired location.
4.Select the button by placing the cursor anywhere within the button text.
5.In the Properties sidebar, go to the button properties. Open the property group Fillable PDF Form, and set the Enabled property to yes. The button is now enabled to perform a fillable-PDF-form button action. Alternatively, you can set the property value to an XPath expression that evaluates to the string yes. This is useful, for example, if you wish to specify via a global user-declared parameter that a control is fillable. In this case, first define a global user-declared parameter with a value of yes, then set the enabled property to an XPath expression that calls the parameter, for example: \$MyFillablePDFParam. Since the parameter's value is yes, the control's fillable property will then be enabled.
6.In the Fillable PDF Form property group, you can also set the button's border style. Other properties related to the button's appearance can be set in the Styles sidebar.
Button types
After a button has been placed in the design and defined as a fillable-PDF-form button (see previous section above), you can define what kind of action the button will perform. Do this as follows. In the Fillable PDF Form property group (of the Properties sidebar), select a button action from the combo box of the Form type property.
The following button actions are available.
There are four navigation buttons: First page; Previous page; Next page; and Last page. These buttons enable the end user to navigate through the pages of the PDF document. |
There are two buttons that enable users to delete/reset data in fields:
•Empty: Deletes the content of all fields in the document: not only input fields, but also data associated with check box and radio button controls. •Reset: Resets the content of all fields in the document to the values contained in the Working XML File. Data associated with check box and radio button controls will also be reset. If no default value exists for a field, then the field is reset to empty. |
The Print button enables the user to print the PDF form. Which pages to print can be specified in the Print dialog that appears before the print job is sent to the printer. Note that the check box and radio button controls are not selected till the user explicitly clicks in them; default values from the Working XML File are not represented in the PDF form, and are not printed. |
The Submit button enables users to submit the PDF form data they have filled to a server. In the Properties sidebar, two additional button properties must be specified for the Submit button.
•Submit type: Available values are fdf file and pdf file. The selected value determines the format of the document that is submitted to the URL at Submit URL. •Submit URL: The URL of the server location to which the document is submitted.
For more information about the Submit procedure, see Saving and Submitting. |