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Does PDF Viewer support mail merge?

Hello Syncfusion, I am looking into your product for the PDF Viewer https://ej2.syncfusion.com/react/demos/#/bootstrap5/pdfviewer/form-designer


I had a few questions, I wanted to ask before we look into potentially using this product.


We have mail merge fields (which are data that is coming from our software based on i.e the patient or dr information)  that would need to be built into both the form designer and displayed based on the PDF Viewer mode.


1/Can you build in-mail merge fields into the form designer? If so How can we do it?


2/if we use a PDF Viewer we created within Adobe that includes the custom mail merge fields, will we be able to upload and then use the PDF Viewer to display it?


3/I have tried to use the upload feature for a form and it doesn’t display the PDF Itself, so I am not sure what are the compatible versions and types of pdf that can be uploaded from Adobe Acrobat Pro? Can you please confirm please.


5 Replies 1 reply marked as answer

VV Visvesvar Venkatesan Syncfusion Team October 11, 2022 02:34 PM UTC

Hi MinWin,


To achieve your requirement, we suggest setting the text form field in a Word document, then execute mail merge and convert into PDF. In the final PDF document, we can add the signature by finding the text form field in the PDF using the Essential PDF library and replacing it with the signature.


Please refer to the sample application from the below link


Sample:  
https://www.syncfusion.com/downloads/support/directtrac/general/ze/WordToPDF-1226574763


In this sample, we have done the below things: 

1. Loaded the Word document. 

2. Execute mail merge and convert the Word document to PDF using the Word library (DocIO). 

3. During Word to PDF conversion, enable the flag PreserveFormFields to preserve form fields in the converted PDF. 

4. Then, find the form fields in PDF and replace them with SignatureField using the PDF library.


If your specific document alone is not loading, kindly provide us your document to investigate further on this.



Regards,

Visvesvar K V



AK Ameer Khalaf October 18, 2022 02:52 AM UTC

Are you planning to enhance your PDF Form builder with mail merge fields, just like the inclusion of mail merge in the syncfusion document editor?


Our aim would be to add our own mail merge fields into fields such as the text and ,dropdown when creating the document. When 'previewing' the document we would require those mail merge fields to be translated into data based on sender/patient and contact information - just like the current product we are building.


Or are you planning to enhance the current document editor with a form builder - for example, a radio button, list box. We are trying to decide between the two but not sure if the form builder has the possibility to add mail merge fields in?








JM Johnson Monohar M Syncfusion Team October 18, 2022 07:55 PM UTC

Hi Min Win,


Please find the details below.


Are you planning to enhance your PDF Form builder with mail merge fields, just like the inclusion of mail merge in the Syncfusion document editor?

 

Our aim would be to add our own mail merge fields into fields such as the text and , dropdown when creating the document. When 'previewing' the document we would require those mail merge fields to be translated into data based on sender/patient and contact information - just like the current product we are building.

 

Sorry, there is no plan to create a form builder with mail merge fields. Instead, we suggest creating the form fields dynamically and updating their values from the database as needed.

 

You can refer to the documentation on how to create form fields programmatically.

https://ej2.syncfusion.com/react/documentation/pdfviewer/form-designer/create-fillable-PDF-forms/create-programmatically/

Or are you planning to enhance the current document editor with a form builder - for example, a radio button, list box. We are trying to decide between the two but not sure if the form builder has the possibility to add mail merge fields in?

Essential DocIO's mail merge functionality replaces the merge fields alone. It doesn’t replace the form fields (text, dropdown, radio button, list box). Moreover, DocIO supports Textbox, Check Box, and Drop-Down form fields alone. The list box and radio buttons are not supported.

 

If the supported merge fields are fine to use at your end, we can suggest getting the data from the database and creating the supported form fields in the Word document. Then convert it to PDF and view it in the PDF Viewer.


Regards,

Johnson



AK Ameer Khalaf October 18, 2022 11:34 PM UTC

Hello Johnson,


Thank you for the clear and concise reply, which helps us understand the limitation of the form builder and the current syncfusion documentation.


I also wanted to ask what Adobe Acrobat PDF Versions do you support?



VV Visvesvar Venkatesan Syncfusion Team October 19, 2022 01:22 PM UTC

Hi Min Win,


Currently, we are generating pdf version 1.5. We do have support to create PDF versions up to 2.0. We have support to change the version of the PDF document using the document.file structure.Version API.


Please refer to the below links for more information,

https://www.syncfusion.com/kb/9506/how-to-change-the-pdf-version-using-c-and-vb-net


Please let us know if you need any further assistance with this.



Regards,

Visvesvar K V 


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