Write a Fillable PDF to a ColdFusion Server

[Ginney]

I have a PDF Form template
I have an FDF file used to populate the template
I know how to display the populated PDF on a web page.

WHAT I NEED TO KNOW is how to write the populated PDF to a file on the server.

The process:
A PDF template exists on the server.
The users enter data in an html form.
A CF app uses that data to create an FDF file

Now I need to use the FDF file to create a NEW PDF document and I need to save the resulting file on the server, not display it in a browser.

I am using Acrobat Professional 8.0 and CFMX.

Thanks!

[insuractive]

I'm not sure you can using the FDF / PDF approach. I know that you definitely CAN do that with one of the following techniques:

1) <cf_pdfform> - custom tag from Ben Forta (also built-in functionality in CF8)
http://www.forta.com/blog/index.cfm/2006/7/27/cf_pdfform

2) iText - Java library for creating / editing PDF's (its what CF 7 uses for some of its <cfdocument> functionality. check out this thread for some sample code:

http://www.adobe.com/cfusion/webforums/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=7&threadid=1268464

Hope that helps!

[Ginney]

Thanks for the tip - I love Ben Forta's tag!

[Guest]

this u get your pdf working? and does it suppress blank lines if necessary?

[Ginney]

I was able to get Ben Forta's tag to work in CFMX, but I just did a simple test to make sure it was able to use supplied key/value pairs to fill in the form fields. It did and it correctly saved the new pdf file to the specified folder. It was pretty easy to install and to use.

When you mention suppressing blank lines, I suspect you are talking about a resulting FDF file. If that is the case, you do not have to worry about those issues with this tag, as you are not creating an FDF file. You are using a JAVA API to create the filled PDF.

Beside Ben Forta's tag, I also tried the iText approach and it worked quite well.