"Filling Forms on the Server"

By Rowan Hanna
PDF Store Support Team
Issue 29 for 2005

Processing forms on the server provides a great deal of power and flexibility. Depending on the system, users can either fill out the form online, or download the form and use a "submit" button to send their data back to the server. For projects of a large or unknown scale, server solutions offer a good way to control costs and ensure that all respondents can respond in the same way. The server approach returns control to the form providers, as the data will be processed on their end.

While enabling the filling and saving of PDF forms in Reader is possible with Adobe Reader Extensions Server, its enterprise-level pricing may discourage smaller companies from adopting a server-based forms workflow. The good news is that there are many options available to you. For instance, implementations of Formium offer the powerful ability to export form data while producing flattened PDFs of the filled forms. These flattened forms can then be emailed back to the user, completing the loop.

These are just some of the many tools available from PDF Store's range of PDF Forms & FDF products.