{"id":1566,"date":"2018-01-19T19:22:59","date_gmt":"2018-01-19T19:22:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/goofy-trucks.flywheelsites.com\/fdf-support-in-php-page-2\/"},"modified":"2018-01-19T19:24:53","modified_gmt":"2018-01-19T19:24:53","slug":"fdf-support-in-php-page-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/phpbuilder.com\/fdf-support-in-php-page-2\/","title":{"rendered":"FDF Support in PHP Page 2"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\n
By Uwe Steinmann<\/div>\n
on November 16, 2000<\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
\n

How it works<\/h2>\n
\nAdobe<\/a> has developed the portable document format
\n(PDF) and extended it over the last years. One of these extensions are Acrobat
\nForms which allow a user to input data and send it to the
\nserver where it is evaluated, just as HTML forms. Such a PDF document is
\nvery similar to a static PDF document, but when you look at it with
\nthe Acrobat Reader, you will find areas which can be edited. <\/div>\n
\nThere are many input fields available just like in HTML, e.g. a submit and reset
\nbutton, text input fields, check boxes etc.. Creating such a PDF form
\nrequires Acrobat Exchange 3.x or the
\nnew Acrobat 4 software, which unfortunately only runs on Windows and MacOS.
\nBoth provide a mode to place the different input fields into an existing
\nPDF document. The submit button carries an attribute which specifies the
\nURL to call when it is pressed. This is very similar to HTML, but can differ
\nin the format when the entered data is transfered to the server.
\nData from HTML forms is transfered using a certain syntax which can be
\nobserved in the URL after hitting the submit button.
\nAcrobat Forms support this format, but also FDF (Form Data Format).<\/div>\n
\nFDF is a new format which requires the
\nFDF Toolkit<\/a>
\n(current version is 4.0)
\nto parse. If PHP has FDF support compiled, it can parse FDF data and
\naccess any field by its name. FDF data is currently stored by PHP in
\nthe variable HTTP_RAW_POST_DATA (just as HTML data is stored in HTTP_POST_DATA).
\nThe actual evaluation of the data has to be done in the PHP script, as opposed
\nto the HTML post data which is evaluated by the PHP engine.<\/div>\n
\nTo get an impression of what the FDF data looks like, here is an example:<\/div>\n
\n%FDF-1.2 %???????? 1 0 obj <\/p>\n
\nIt is just the first portion of a complete record, but one should be able to
\nclearly identify
\nthe input field comment<\/em> and its value. Here is text for testing<\/em>.<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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