Okay I want to put forms (e.g. contracts, deed, complaints) on my site

should I use Adobe acrobat?

[jpmuldoon]

Hmm, I have this Adobe acrobat reader 4.0 can that be used to create a form for a web site? I open adobe but everything is dimmed out, does it only read adobe created stuff?

suggestions? I want to create simple forms so people can download them and use them from my site.

Thanks

[digitalv]

You need Acrobat, not Acrobat Reader. Acrobat Reader is only used for READING PDF files, not creating them.

[jpmuldoon]

Is that basically my only option? I have dreamweaver and macromedia flash are they of any use? I want to do this right and if Adobe is it then okay.

[trillianjedi]

You don't need Acrobat, but you do need some form of Acrobat authoring software. Adobe Acrobat is just one of many.

There's quite a few free ones around for linux.

If you're on Windows, have a surf around the web for "acrobat authoring".

TJ

[shigamoto]

I use PDF 995, download the printer driver on:
[pdf995.com...]

It will add an extra printer to your computer, then just select print in the program you have written the document and then print it using PDF995, simple, free and ok results :)

Good luck!

Daniel

[jpmuldoon]

OKay thanks. THe pdf995 thing; if I create forms using that and put them on my web page are people going to have to download some different softward in order to print out the forms? I realize most people already have adobe reader on their machines so they view stuff done in adobe. But if I use pdf995 is that going to ask visitors to download another software program? I dont want to make it more difficult for them.

[shigamoto]

No the files that PDF 995 creates can be used with Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Good luck!

Daniel

[encyclo]

You can also use the excellent free Office replacement Openoffice [openoffice.org] - it can read most Microsoft Office files easily, and it has a one-click PDF Export button to quickly transform any document as PDF.

Openoffice is available for Windows, Linux and several other platforms.

[jpmuldoon]

Oh okay great, so if I use either one of these products mentioned above, my visitors can simply hit "print" and the form document will print out on their computer?

Thanks for all this information. This is the kind of stuff that is hard to figure out if you dont work w/ this stuff every day. For example I did a search for "forms" + website and all google gives me is a bunch of those programs that allow visitors to input information, not paper forms!

Of course if someone works with this stuff everyday the question is easy. Thanks for getting me past these sorts of roadblocks.

[jpmuldoon]

Oh another question and this maybe getting ahead of myself. I create a form document in PDF form, and then I write a web site. How does browser read the form? Do I keep the PDF document in a folder on the website, or is the PDF document simply part of the webpage and it reads that. I am probably misunderstanding something, but a clarification here would be useful.

[shigamoto]

Well you are going to have to store the PDF file in a directory (anywhere were you see fit) on the server that you are using, after that you'll just make a link to that PDF file, when the user clicks the link it will open Adobe Acrobat Reader (or any other program the user has associated with that particular file format).

[benihana]

when you link to the pdf file as described above, its worth telling people that the file they are going to open is a pdf file, so they dont get a surprise when acrobat reader pops up

[jpmuldoon]

okay this is quite understandable now. Much more understandable than the explanation of why the phone company cant transfer my phone number to their local service plan:

current local service (big mega telephone company) wont release the line. I talk to cheaper long distance/localprovider. "Why wont theyr release the line" "Because it has remote call forwarding. "Well can I take that off the line?" "You'll have to call them. "Okay what do I say to them? "Hold on I'll let you speak to someone else? "What do you want? "I want to know what to say to the phone company? "Well they arent' going to release the remote call forwarding service." "Huh? But I was just told they would. "Well you can ask them...But they probably wont. "So what do I have to do to get your service?"YOu have to have get a different number.."

What the hell...?

[jo1ene]

Ghostscript and Ghostgum convert pretty much any file to pdf also. You'd print to GS and open the result in GG and convert to pdf.

[cs.wisc.edu...]

[jpmuldoon]

Okay so I downloaded OpenOffice.org program and the program to unzip it: 7zip. Okay so how do I unzip this stupid thing? I try to open OpenOffice but it keeps wanting me to use Netzip which has expired on my computer. Can I just open 7zip? but there are all these folders. Thanks.

[sem4u]

Tried using WinZip?

[jpmuldoon]

Hmm, OTOH I've managed to download and open Ghostscript. The only issue with that is where the hell is ghostgum? Is it already loaded w/ Ghostscript? Is it another download? SOmething else? THere is a lot of documentation for this so I'll probably find it eventually.

[jo1ene]

It's a separate utility.

[jpmuldoon]

Sem: open office did unzip with winzip! And it looks pretty self explanatory so far.

Thanks for the tip, Buddy.

[beginner]

This may not be the ideal forum, but could you not use PHP for the forms?