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Introduction
Welcome to the first step in an exciting journey I call Enhancing Adobe Acrobat DC Forms
with JavaScript.
My journey into learning about Adobe software began 17 years ago when I started
college. I took a two-year Graphic Communications course in Vancouver, BC. While
learning about how to set up documents for print layout using QuarkXPress and later
Adobe InDesign, I created PDF files. At that point, I only saw the PDF as a transition from
one file format to the next production step, from layout to the printing press. It never
crossed my mind what else could be done with PDF files in Adobe Acrobat.
Several years after graduating, while doing freelance work for one of my clients,
I began to investigate the features of Acrobat to discover what else the program had to
offer. In 2008, I decided to learn more about web design and improve my layout skills
in Adobe software. After finishing three certificates in Web Design at Langara College
Continuing Studies, I realized that I wanted to help students learn more about Adobe
software. There were times through the journey when I read different computer books
and felt, “OK I’ve finished this tutorial or project, but how does this relate to the real world
and what I’m trying to accomplish?” In 2011, I became a Teaching Assistant at Langara
College and this gave me the opportunity to write my own course on introducing students
to Adobe Acrobat. While writing it, I realized there was a lot more that could be said about
Acrobat than what I could present in three-evening course. At that point, I was looking at
one icon in the Acrobat menu that perplexed me. It was called JavaScript.
JavaScript in Acrobat? What is this doing here? The only JavaScript that I knew about
at that point was through building websites. I had built a few basic template forms using
LiveCycle Designer, MS Word, and Acrobat, but I had never used JavaScript in the Acrobat
program. So I began to wonder how JavaScript could improve my forms.
So, this is when and how the idea began for developing a book for students on the
topic of Acrobat and JavaScript. After years of research, looking at Adobe and Acrobat
forums, and studying the questions and concerns users had when trying to add JavaScript
to Acrobat, I came to the following conclusions:
• Users are looking for simple solutions to programing an Acrobat
form that they will use in real-world situations. Many are looking
for the same answers.
• When documentation is not written in a simplified manner, the
average user becomes intimidated. They will shy away from using
the JavaScript menu and eventually give up and ignore the tool.
To them, JavaScript coding is like a foreign language, and the
average person who has not taken web design lessons does not
have a clue what it means or where the code should be inserted,
since the form field’s property dialog boxes look nothing like a
web page.
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