[Solved] Saving PDFs with forms for both Microsoft & Apple

[mellyd]

Hi there!

I used Open Office Writer to draw up an agreement for my business. I used fillable forms to be able to fill in information individually for each client using the same template. I fill the forms, then save it as a PDF and send it to my clients. This mostly works like a charm, however recently I heard from two clients that they receive blank forms. I think it's because they use Apple devices. Is there some sort of setting I am missing to make it so that it can be viewed (& printed) with both Apple and Microsoft devices?

Hope I described that clearly thanks for any tips in advance!

Best,
Melly

[jrkrideau]

Can you upload a sample form in .odt and .pdf format here? It is very strange that yor clients cannot read a PDF. It is pretty universal.

[mellyd]

Oh they can read the PDF, but they can't see what was filled into the forms. (Maybe I'm using the wrong terms - sorry! Not a native English speaker)

I've uploaded the odt and pdf now, hopefully that'll make it more clear The texts that say "Example of what clients aren't seeing" are - surprise - the ones that those clients don't see.

[FJCC]

I do not see the text in the form fields if I open the PDF in Firefox but I do see it if I open the pdf with Adobe Acrobat Reader. I ran these tests on a Windows 10 system.

[Zizi64]

I do not see the text in the form fields if I open the PDF in Firefox but I do see it if I open the pdf with Adobe Acrobat Reader. I ran these tests on a Windows 10 system.

Same behavior when I exported the attached .odt file into PDF format from my LibreOffice 6.4.7.

example_Exported from LO.pdf

(82.87 KiB) Downloaded 133 times

[mellyd]

Thank you guys for the tests. Interesting.. Does anyone have any tips on how to fix it?

[John_Ha]

Does anyone have any tips on how to fix it?

Ask an Apple user to install Adobe Reader. Does it then work?

What options are you using in File > Export as PDF > General ...? Do you tick Create Form? And do you select PDF? When I do both the created PDF shows all text in Adobe Reader and in Firefox on W10.

The Writer manual p162 says

Create PDF form - Submit format: Choose the format of submitting forms from within the PDF file. This setting overrides the control’s URL property that you set in the document. There is only one common setting valid for the whole PDF document: PDF (sends the whole document), FDF (sends the control contents), HTML, and XML. Most often you will choose the PDF format.

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[mellyd]

What options are you using in File > Export as PDF > General ...? Do you tick Create Form? And do you select PDF? When I do both the created PDF shows all text in Adobe Reader and in Firefox on W10.

It was actually set to FDF. I set it to PDF and tried again but my client says the forms are still empty. Unfortunately they didn't say what exactly they were using, just "apple products" again.

[RoryOF]

A possible work-around may be to download and install a PDF pseudo printer, and instead of using /File /Export to PDF, use /File /Print : to PDF pseudo printer. Not using Windows I cannot make any specific suggestion.

[mellyd]

A possible work-around may be to download and install a PDF pseudo printer, and instead of using /File /Export to PDF, use /File /Print : to PDF pseudo printer. Not using Windows I cannot make any specific suggestion.

This works. With this method, my clients can no longer change or add to what I have written into the forms but at least they can read what I put in there. Since the agreement needs to be printed for them to sign anyway, additional notes can still be added in handwriting so I think this is a good enough solution for me. Thank you!

I will mark the topic as solved.