Introduction

I've been working with Adobe LiveCycle Designer ES 8.2 for a while, designing forms that end users can fill-in on their computer screen and then email back to the company or administration at the click of a button.

My general impression is good. LiveCycle Designer is an impressive and extensive tool that is mostly up for the job.

However, not surprising with this complexity, it has its generous share of idiosyncrasies, flaws, and defects, and one purpose of this article is to alert other users to the pitfalls and get them up to speed as quickly as possible. Another purpose is to share Javascript code that I use for automatic in-field and between-fields operations like input validation or the opening and closing of form sections.

What's an XFA form?

Not content with its original PDF format, which is already being expanded all the time, Adobe chose a rather different format for its new forms: XFA. This format has a different object model and is indeed up to its task.

It is a part of and normally embedded in PDF, so the normal user won't notice the difference, but its internal workings are different and, for my taste, better. An XFA form has a nice, hierarchical structure that is good to work with.

For the programmer, just like the topmost object in a web browser is document or window, the topmost object in an XFA form is, nobody would have guessed, xfa. So you get Javascript functions like xfa.host.messageBox(…), and your input field somewhere down can have a lengthy name leading top-down through your document object hierarchy.

[To be continued]

How to open a PDF file with the right program

(Reader, Designer, Pro)

What to put on the work screen

The dreaded Myriad Pro default font and how to get rid of it

Efficient use of cascaded subforms

Field borders vs. paragraph borders

Background colors wreak havoc with frame lines.

How to deal with field and subform frame lines

Javascript functions and how to use them

Don't forget to empty the form.

How to allow PDF mailing instead of XML mailing