As you know, Adobe dramatically changed the naming conventions for fields created within Designer 7. In Acrobat 5/6 you can do the following:
Date.0
OrderID.0.0
OrderID.1.0
Date.1
OrderID.0.1
OrderID.1.1
I’ve found no way to preserve hierarchy in Designer 7 and I’m wondering if it’s still possible. If it’s possible to preserve hierarchy and Adobe simply moved this information elsewhere in their DOM, could you add support for this in the Pdf.Form API?
Thank you.
A quick follow-up:
Form designers can always manually include a hierarchy by naming each field, but this isn’t desirable for large forms. I’m looking for a way to auto-generate fieldnames and preserve hierarchy like I could with Acrobat 5/6.
Dear cohenn,
1)Just as you said, the Adobe Designer 7.0 has changed the field name format. It is not completely compatible with the 6.0. For example the field name “OrderID.0.0” has auto been changed into “F[0].P1[0].OrderID_0_0[0]”. And the “F[0].P1[0].” is auto generated, it is difficult to delete it or make it into the format of 6.0.
2)In Adobe Designer 7.0, the hierarchy field name is also supported as the pdf specifiction 1.6 said. But in the Adobe Designer 7.0 GUI, it is not supported well.
3)About “a way to auto-generate fieldnames and preserve hierarchy like I could with Acrobat 5/6”, I am not very familiar with the function in Adobe Designer 7.0 GUI. But I will test it ASAP. And you could also ask the Adobe’s customer service about the problem, they will have the more authoritative answers.
Best regards.
Thanks. I’ll look into the matter as well.
Dear cohenn,
I don’t know whether you have solved the problem.
Anyway, this is the answer from Adobe service. I hope it will help you.
"If you want to have two fields with the same name, simply add them to the form with the exact same name. Under the covers, the system will add all of the extra information as described in the thread. What I believe you are looking for is the very last digit at the end of the field name with the square brackets. This has sometimes been referred to as the instance number of the field. The number is automatically added to the field based on it’s position on the page (starting at the top left and moving to the bottom right).
This should allow you to create a table with repeating rows with the same field names being used through the form. You can reference a specific instance using the square bracket and instance number). "
Best regards.
Not really. I’m looking for something like:
field.[0]
field.[0][0]
field.[1][0]
field.[2][0]
field.[1]
I haven’t found a way to tell Designer 7 to do this automatically.
Dear cohenn,
Acrobat 7 and Adobe Designer 7 create different type of forms. The former creates AcroForm which is simple and compatible well with the old version Acrobat. The later creates XFA form which is complex and not well compatible.
Here is a support site which may be helpful to you. You could ask your questions there.
Best regards.