I am new to working with Adobe Acrobat Pro XI and Adobe Reader XI. Based on research I have done and questions answered in the Adobe Communities and Forum, I wanted to make sure I understand the limitations of these two products before I report back to my supervisor. (We do not want to use XFA forms to obtain data in an xml file.)
1. Adobe Reader XI will allow a user to save a fillable PDF document to his/her local PC. But it is only possible to save it as a PDF.
2. Adobe Reader XI will not allow a user to export the data in a fillable PDF into an xml file (unless you purchase the LiveCycle Reader Extensions license).
3. Adobe Reader XI will not allow a PDF file to be displayed in a .NET program unless the "Enable Protected Mode at startup" checkbox in Preferences/Security(Enhanced) has been unchecked. (The previous version of Reader would allow this without disabling security.)
4. Adobe Acrobat Pro XI will allow a user to scan a form and create a fillable PDF.
5. Adobe Acrobat Pro XI will allow a user to save the fillable form as a PDF or XML. However, it is the form that is being saved as an XML file. Not the data.
6. Adobe Acrobat Pro XI will allow a user to export the data of a form into an xml file, an .fdf file, an .xfdf file, or a .txt file.
7. If a programmer writes a program in .NET to save the data of a PDF as an .xfdf file using IAC code, it will only work on a PC that has Adobe Acrobat (Standard or Pro). If we need this executable to work on other PCs, we would need to purchase additional licenses of Adobe Acrobat - a license for every PC that needs to run the executable.
8. If a programmer writes JavaScript code using trusted functions to get around security issues, that code will work on a PC that has Adobe Acrobat (Standard or Pro) but will not work on Adobe Reader XI. Again, if we wanted our JavaScript to work, we would need to purchase Adobe Acrobat for every PC that would run the code.
Please let me know if I have understood all of this correctly. Thank you.