"Merging PDF forms"

By Ewout Prangsma
Tall Applications
Issue 9 for 2007

Most of us know forms merging as combining a customer letter with a database resulting in a set of letters with personalized customer names and addresses. Of course it can be much more complicated, e.g. automatically generated reports with variable content. These reports can be exported as PDF, printed or even sent on demand over the Internet.

As a result of the ever expanding reach of Internet and digital workflows, additional requirements are made in the world of forms merging. Pre-filling and routing of digital forms has become a hot topic. Pre-filling PDF forms also means preparing the forms for use by ordinary users. This implies form field validation, fool proof forms design and rapid feedback. Once filled out, the user should submit the form after which (semi) automatic processing of the form data has to take place. Processing can result in new forms being sent out, data being stored in a database or a report being printed.

A product like PDF/Mergician combines well known forms merging with modern pre-filling and routing into one highly flexible forms environment. With the upcoming version 3 of PDF/Mergician workflow functionality has become much easier and report generation has become more powerful (with the introduction of paragraphs that are laid out on as many pages as needed).

Other products typically focus on reporting or forms management. Formium is a forms management solution that works on various form types (HTML and PDF, with others coming) and focuses on forms distribution and scheduling. ARTS PDF Variform Plus and VisualMerge focus more on the generation of personalized PDF reports. ARTS PDF Variform Plus runs as an Acrobat plug-in, where as PDF/Mergician, Formium and VisualMerge run as standalone applications.

Still want more? Check out the Forms category at PDF Store or feel free to contact the PDF Store Support Team.