Creating form field tables

Building a table of form fields is a snap. The fields can be all the same type or different types, and the methods for creating a table vary slightly, depending on which case is true. To create a table made up of form fields that are all the same type, follow these steps:

1. Add a form field to your PDF in the area you want to serve as the corner of your table.

2. Hold down the Ctrl key (the Option key on the Mac) and draw a marquee around the single field to select it.
If you’re selecting one field only, it’s just as easy to click the field to select it. Using the Ctrl key (Option key on Mac) is better for selecting multiple fields and ensures you won’t create one big form field when what you really want is to make a multiple selection.

3. Choose Advanced➪Forms➪Fields➪Create Multiple Copies or rightclick the selected field and choose Create Multiple Copies on the context menu.
The Create Multiple Copies of Fields dialog box appears.

4. Specify the layout for your form field table by choosing options in the following areas of the Create Multiple Copies of Fields dialog box:
• Number of Fields: Use the spinner buttons or enter a value in the Copy Selected Fields Down or Copy Selected Fields Across text fields. If the Preview check box in the lower left corner of the dialog box is selected, all changes made in this dialog box are displayed for preview in the current document behind the dialog box.
• Overall Size (All Fields): Use the spinner buttons or enter a value in the Change Width or Change Height text fields to alter the size of the fields in your table. The default values in these fields reflect the size of the original field selected in the current document.
• Overall Position (All Fields): To move the entire table in the current document to a new position, click the Up, Left, Right, or Down buttons.

5. When you’re finished selecting options, click OK to close the Create Multiple Copies of Fields dialog box and view your form table in the current document.

To create a table made up of different field types, you need to vary the preceding steps slightly. Instead of creating a single field (as in Step 2), you need to create an initial row or column of different field types that will serve as a basis not only for the number of rows or columns that appear in your table but also for how the different field types will occur in the table. After establishing that, you then individually select and copy each field type in the Create Multiple Copies of Fields dialog box using the Copy Selected Fields Down or Across options, depending on the original location (at the head of a column or beginning of a row) of the selected field in the current document. Creating fields for tables in the manner just described is not the same as duplicating form fields. In this process, you give each field a unique name, which allows a higher degree of individual editing choices. Therefore, it’s not the method to use if you want to create a group of related radio buttons that must have the same name. See the “Understanding the Options tab” section, earlier in this chapter, for more on creating radio buttons. When your form is in the development stage and you’re beginning to accumulate a number of fields, it’s a good idea to take advantage of the Fields palette. Choose View➪Navigation Tabs➪Fields to display the Fields palette, as shown in Figure. The Fields palette is a floating navigation pane that provides a hierarchical, icon view of the fields in a PDF. It allows you to remotely select, rename, delete, edit the properties of, and more importantly, lock/unlock a field. Locked fields can’t be moved or edited, which comes in handy when you’ve gotten a number of fields just where you want them but are still fiddling with others in the form. To access these commands, right-click (Control+click on the Mac) a field icon in the Fields palette and choose the desired command from the context menu that appears. To lock/unlock a field, choose Properties on the context menu and select or deselect the Locked check box in the Properties dialog box that appears.

Setting Layout Grid Preferences

Acrobat 6 provides a wealth of tools that make the process of laying out and modifying form fields quick and easy. One of these tools is the Layout Grid —a non-printing, customizable on-screen grid that provides guidelines for drawing field boxes with the seven form field tools. To show or hide the Layout Grid, choose View➪Grid or press Ctrl+U (Ô+U on the Mac). The best part of the Layout Grid, however, is its Snap to Grid feature, which causes field boundaries to snap to gridlines when they’re being drawn, as shown in Figure. To turn this feature on or off, choose View➪Snap to Grid or press Ctrl+Shift+U (Ô+Shift+U on the Mac). Note that because these two features are discrete, the Snap to Grid feature will still work even if the Layout Grid is hidden and vice versa. A check mark next to either command’s name on the menu bar lets you know the feature is turned on.
Layout Grid preferences let you specify a grid’s spacing, position on a page, subdividing lines, and color. Choose Edit➪Preferences or press Ctrl+K (Ô+K on the Mac) to open the Preferences dialog box, and then click Units & Guides in the list box to display the options.
The following options are found in the Layout Grid area:

• To specify the space between major gridlines, click the spinner buttons or enter a measurement in the Width and Height between Lines text boxes.
• To offset the Layout Grid from the top-left corner of the page, click the spinner buttons or enter a measurement in the Grid Offset from the Left Edge or Grid Offset from the Top Edge text boxes.
• To display a specified number of subdividing lines between major gridlines, click the spinner buttons or enter a number in the Subdivisions text box.
• To specify the color of the gridlines, click the Grid Line Color button and select the desired color on the color palette (Windows) or the color picker dialog box (Mac) that appears.

When you’re finished selecting Layout Grid preferences, click OK to apply your changes and close the Preferences dialog box. You’ll probably find that the Layout Grid isn’t really very useful for adding fields to ready-made forms that you’ve scanned into Acrobat 6 because its gridlines will rarely match the cells that are already drawn in your paper form. In these cases, use the Align commands to keep your fields straight. Where it really makes sense to use the Layout Grid is in designing and building a form from scratch. Here’s a quick and easy method of getting a blank page into Acrobat 6 so you can use the Layout Grid to custom build a form: Open a new blank document in Microsoft Word (Windows or Mac) and click the Convert to PDF button on the PDFMaker 6.0 toolbar. You can open the resulting blank PDF in Acrobat 6, configure and display the Layout Grid, and then start cranking out a form of your own design.

Singling out the Signed tab

Options on the Signed tab apply only to the Signature field type. Its commands enable you to specify actions that occur in a form when data is entered into a blank signature field. You add signature fields to a form in the same manner as you do other form fields by using the Digital Signature tool. The Digital Signature tool creates a blank signature field that can
be filled out as part of completing a form.
To configure a blank signature field, click one of the three radio buttons on the Signed tab:

• Nothing Happens When Signed: Use this default option if you don’t want any actions to occur to data entered in a field.
• Mark as Read-Only: Provides a means of locking portions of a form at the time it is signed off in the signature field, in essence “freezing” the form at that moment in time. Select one of three items on the drop-down list: All Fields, All Fields Except These, and Just These Fields. If you select either of the latter two options, click the Pick button to open the Field Selection dialog box, where you choose the fields you want to render as read-only. Pick a field by selecting the check box next to the field name in the Mark Fields as Read Only list box. When you’re finished adding fields, click the OK button.
• This Script Executes When the Signature Field Is Signed: Click this radio button to execute a specific JavaScript action when data is entered in a signature field. Click the Edit button to open the JavaScript Edit window. If you’re familiar with JavaScript language, you can write your own or copy and paste a predefined JavaScript in the script editing window. Click OK to close the JavaScript Edit window. The action script appears in a preview box below the radio button. Note that you can use the arrow keys to view the script, but you can’t edit it.