Adobe® Acrobat® 8 PDF Bible

Chapter 35. Working with Form Data

IN THIS CHAPTER

• Creating data calculations

• Importing and exporting form data

• Distributing and retrieving forms in review sessions

After you get a handle on creating form fields, as covered in Chapter 34, you'll want to know some things about managing data to help economize your efforts when working with forms and performing routine calculations on data fields. When forms are completed, you have the option of printing a form, compiling form data distributed via e-mails, or sending the data off to a host that processes the field data. In this chapter, I cover data management from calculating field data to importing, exporting, submitting data, and compiling data using the new Distribute Form and Compile Returned Forms features in Acrobat 8.

As is the case with most of the content in Chapter 34, this chapter is also targeted at users who aren't using Adobe Designer. Most of what is covered in this chapter can be handled by Designer. However, if you're a Macintosh user or you want to do some editing in Acrobat Professional, what follows is strictly related to working with data and form fields in Acrobat. Furthermore, the content is restricted to using Acrobat tools and commands for data management. No discussion on using server products, other than a brief explanation about additional products you can acquire, is covered in this chapter.

For Windows users, the best opportunity you have when working with form data is to create your form designs in Adobe Designer ...