iTextSharp create PDF from another and add form data

Question

I use ITextSharp to create a PDF with form data based on another PDF. The problem is the file generated is not editable (the form on it).

If I use ITextSharp in append mode, I get the form editable but most of the form data is not preserved. I want the user to see the resulted PDF with the PDF Form data preserved.

I understand there is NOTHING I can do. The only way for the user to edit the resulted PDF is to use a paid Acrobat version on it. This is because I CHANGE the PDF file by entering form data and setting fonts on it. Is there something I can do?

Paul

While the current answers employ educated guesswork, the situation may be different for your specific PDF. Thus, please share it for analysis of the issue. — mkl, Aug 12 '16 at 12:17

score 1 · Answer 1 · edited May 23 '17 at 11:51

Your question isn't very clear, but here are some answers to similar questions that have been asked before:

End users can't edit a form locally unless the form is "reader-enabled". Making a form reader-enabled is only possible when you use Adobe software: "Adding Enable for commenting Adobe Reader" using Acrobat
You need to fill out reader-enabled forms in append mode if you don't want to break the reader-enabling: Pdf with Acroform editing using iText
This doesn't mean you can't ask people to fill out a PDF form to gather data. See Edit pdf embedded in the browser and save the pdf directly to server
You can capture that data, and fill out the form without flattening if you want to serve this form (including the data) to the end user: How to fill out a pdf file programmatically?

I'm pretty sure one of these question is a duplicate of what you're asking, but since your question isn't clear, it's hard to mark your question as an exact duplicate of one of them.

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Aug 11 '16 at 18:40

Short answer: No

Pdf file are likely to be secure (read only) and this is why everyone is using it. Most of the time, we convert a file into a pdf so maybe if you can get the 'file' and not the pdf will be a good move there.

From my experience in the past, I can confirm with you that iTextSharp may not convert all your data properly and this can make your generated file unusable. If not, you might have some weird line or some changes in the document behavior (ex. fields are not editable anymore).

If you really want to work with pdf file as input and do your stuff with it, you will need to understand the inner structure of it:

[PDF file format] http://resources.infosecinstitute.com/pdf-file-format-basic-structure/

This can be a hell of a ride. You might need to re-consider the use of a pdf as input. If you can't change that, you might need to use some sort of adobe pluging to do so. Alot of third party pdf library is doing that.

Good luck

iTextSharp create PDF from another and add form data

2 Answers2