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Question

Question

Feature Request: Take a Signature from Forms and Put Into PDF

asked on October 2, 2014 Show version history

With Forms 9.2 and the introduction of the new signature field, is it possible with Workflow to take the image of the signature and put it in a PDF using the Fill PDF activity?

UPDATE

I understand the legal issues with making the feature above a reality. Would it be possible to implement the following feature request instead?

The school district I worked at used an online onboarding system that allowed individuals to apply for job openings. Once approved, the applicant was able to access forms that were uploaded by an administrator for a variety of different things. Within the system they were able to sign the uploaded forms.

Is it possible that this could be done with Laserfiche Forms as well? The idea would be that when the form is uploaded, it could be converted to a different file format as needed. The admin would then be able to select where the electronic signature would be placed on the form (just like an Acrobat signature). Each form that is uploaded could be added to a Laserfiche Forms process as different tabs.

This would allow for the current way Forms works while allowing forms that are required to be in a specific format to be handled as well, such as insurance and 3rd party application forms.

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Replies

replied on October 19, 2016 Show version history

Since this thread started 2 years ago, and a lot of interest, is this something that Laserfiche is taking into consideration? I too have customers that would be able to grow their use if this was able. Even using the field merge option in filling out a Word document. 

 

Has anyone came up with a workaround? 

Thanks!

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replied on June 11, 2015

I thought I should include a User Case on this feature. We currently use Forms for new employee hiring. Part of the process of onboarding is having an employee fill out a W4, I9, etc. Those forms must have an employee's signature on them. We can gather all of the information by creating an LF Form with the same fields and then filling out a fillable PDF using Workflow, but since we are not able to pass the signature to the PDF, it is not a viable option for this type of process. I hope that helps.

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replied on June 11, 2015

Why is a fillable PDF better than having the form sent to Laserfiche as a PDF?

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replied on June 11, 2015

Well, I was under the impression that for a federal form what is submitted needed to be the actual federal form and not one our organization made up. I now have our HR department checking on that theory to see if that is true. Does anyone else know what is required for those?

Apart from federal forms though, we do have insurance and retirement forms that will not take any form that is not theirs. In those cases, we would need to be able to take the signature from the Laserfiche form and put it onto a fillable PDF.

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replied on October 30, 2015

Hi Blake,

We are working on a similar process for one of our customers. What did you find out in regards to the W-9?  

Also, I second Blake's for this feature as well.  We have several instances where a customer would like to take the signature captured in Forms and put it into a PDF that matches the format of the original form.

Thanks,

Jen

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replied on May 18, 2016

We are also looking for a way to streamline the completion, collection and storage of employment forms (W4, I9, DE4, etc.). The IRS and the State of California provide revised, fillable PDFs each year. Our HR provider requires we use the most recent form. So as an example, at the beginning of the year, we always download the newest W4 form from the IRS website.

I was hoping to build a LF Form that would capture basic info (Name, Address, SSN, etc.) and then use Workflow to fill that PDF. The last step would be to capture a signature image and plug it into the PDF. With everything collected, Workflow could then automate the task of faxing the form to my HR vendor and storing the form in my Employee Files portion of the LaserFiche repository. 

That streamlined process would be of value for MANY if there's a way to make it work. I think we can all agree that capturing the data on the fillable PDF and then having to print it, obtain a signature, and rescan it is inefficient. LaserFiche always seems to come up with a solution that helps streamline these processes and I'm hoping that can be achieved here as well. 

 

Thanks,

Justin 

 

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replied on December 14, 2016

We too utilize this, we can use our in house forms and have the Laserfiche signature as part of the form. The problem we run into is the federal forms. So we do the fillabel PDf and email forms for final signature.

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replied on January 31, 2017

I agree, it would fall outside of the regulation compliance to be able to perform this action. How do you prove the legitimacy of the document\signature.

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replied on February 10, 2017

I don't see why if others can provide digitally signed web solution that this could not be built into forms.  I could see where self signed signatures could be a regulatory issue, but a properly signature with a trusted certificate should be an option and trusted signatures for the general public can be obtained for a reasonable fee and some have lengthy expiration periods making it affordable.  With a digital signatures being more prevalent across the web this should be a easy implementation to make as time goes forward.  We can sign things currently from word documents and PDF forms literally in seconds.  Why can't we do this in web forms?

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replied on October 16, 2017

Any progress on taking signatures from Forms and putting them into fillable PDFs?

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replied on October 18, 2017

Instead of transferring images of signatures from a Laserfiche form to a PDF form, why not update Laserfiche Forms to be able to process PDF forms too? For example, when you're building a new LF form, instead of adding fields and building a new form from scratch, you can just insert an existing fillable PDF form. Is this possible?

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replied on August 4, 2017

Hi everyone,

I just had a thought about this. Anita Chiang just referred me to this post after asking her a question on today's CFW. A prospect I'm talking to has four fillable pdf forms that he sends to his clients once a year. Two of the pdf's are created in-house and two others are official Nevada state tax forms. He sends these four pdf forms every year to his clients to update their info if it's been changed, then sign the forms and send them back. Right now he runs this whole process manually. I've been working on building a proof of concept for him. So far, we've created a paginated LF form out of the two fillable pdf's that they've created in-house. But we're stuck when it comes to the official Nevada tax forms and getting the signed properly.

I just thought of an idea, thought I would throw it out here and see if it resolves the issue. I was thinking that being able to embed a fillable PDF form into a LF form can solve this. Kind of like the embedded PDF viewer that's used in the LF document viewer in Client/Web Access. When you go to create a new LF form, instead of dropping fields onto the form canvas, there would be an option to upload/embed a PDF onto the form canvas. That way, the original Nevada state PDF, which would get filled out and signed by the end user, would be used throughout the business process. So the end user fills out and signs the embedded pdf, and that original document that they signed (using the Adobe Reader esig feature), is the one used throughout the business process and it's the one that gets saved to the repository. The regular LF forms in the forms packet would be saved to the repository as LF documents, and the embedded PDF forms in the packet would be saved as PDFs. So it's the original signed document that's being used. We're not transferring the signature field or anything like that.

Could this work legally and technically?

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replied on August 4, 2017

One concern would be after the PDF is signed using the embedded option, how is it saved back to the Forms server so it retains the signature until it is sent to the Laserfiche repository?

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replied on August 4, 2017

Not sure. Maybe someone at LF knows more about the technical details.

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replied on June 17, 2019

Our SIS uses javascript embedded into a "Save" button on FDF forms created in Adobe.  It does an HTTP post of the variable data using hidden fields identifying the student file and screen mask it needs to be associated with upon submission.  That record data then gets added/updated in the student records based on the variable name as if it was input from that screen.  I am not sure why something similar could not be designed to work with and in conjunction with a corresponding LF Web Form that would act as the starting entry into the associated form process.  The actual PDF Form could then become an automatic attachment as if it was an uploaded file retaining the original image and signature certificates for storage at some point within the workflow.

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replied on October 2, 2014

No.

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replied on February 13, 2015

Is this something planned for the future?

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replied on November 6, 2015

Will this be available in Forms 10?

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replied on November 6, 2015

For 10, Forms signatures are not available in the PDF activities because PDF signatures require certificates, not just the image. Retrieve Forms Content activity does provide the signature as a base64 image, so it can be used in scripts if so desired.

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replied on November 6, 2015

Miruna, at the conference would it be possible for Laserfiche to show how what we are asking for could be accomplished using the base64 image? Similar to how before the signature field was available in Forms we were shown how to use some custom javascript, CSS, and fields to accomplish a signature field? It would be very useful.

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replied on April 19, 2016

Having the handwritten signature field from Forms pass through as an image to a PDF field would be a HUGE benefit!  We are using a process for parent registration for children's activities and we must have the parent signature for emergency treatment release.  While we are able to generate the PDF, we are then having to all of the forms and then ask 5,000 + parents to hand sign the completed form on the first day of the program and then scan it back in. There are several other situations where this would be very beneficial.

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replied on April 19, 2016

It's not as simple as it sounds. There are no "image" fields in PDF forms as far as I know. Some of the PDF field functionality that allows mimicking an image field requires Javascript to set up in the PDF form, which is a feature that Adobe does not expose to non-Adobe libraries.

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replied on July 22, 2016

I have searched alot on this topic & it really does seem like a feature that could help alot of companies out there. Would it be possible to have this as a feature anytime soon?

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replied on September 11, 2016

Hi David, we have created some custom scripting that has accomplished this. Please feel free to contact me if you are in need of the solution.

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replied on September 13, 2016

Thank you Andrew.

 

Would it be possible to explain to me how I could go about to execute this?

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replied on September 16, 2016

Andrew, I would be interested in this solution as well.

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replied on September 26, 2016

Hi Andrew, please add me to the list.

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replied on September 27, 2016

Your transferring the image to the repository to store in/with the form, why can you not make it exportable as a variable in png/jpg format to be added to a PDF form?  Would solve alot of problems I am having justifying LaserFiche as a viable platform for digital document management when we have to print all the documents to get a signature then scan them back into the repository.  Wastes space, time and trees!!

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replied on September 28, 2016

Guess you better add me to your list as well Andrew.

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replied on December 8, 2016

Andrew, how can I learn more about your solution?

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replied on December 14, 2016

Has anyone had any success with this?

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replied on January 26, 2017

Andrew, I would also like to know how to pull the signature from the LF form onto a pdf.

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replied on January 31, 2017

This is probably not ever going to be a feature. 

 

The legalities of taking a signature and putting it in another document is not possible, from my understanding. People could take a laserfiche form signature, and then put it on any document they wish. The end user would never know their signature was used else where. 

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replied on March 13, 2017

Andrew, could you send me your solution too?

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replied on April 13, 2017

Andrew-  Can you please send me your solution? Thanks in advance!

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replied on October 18, 2017

Hi Andrew,  Could you send me your solution? Thank you :)

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replied on October 18, 2017

Andrew, please send me your solution also if you can.

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replied on December 14, 2017

Hi Andrew! Would you mind sending over your solution as well please? :)

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replied on March 27, 2018

Hi Andrew, 

 

Can I please also request this functionality?

 

Thanks

Ziad

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replied on November 2, 2018

Late reply, but Andrew, is this still a possibility?

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replied on June 13, 2019

Hi Andrew,

I haven't been able to find out any information on this topic, so I'm very interested as well Andrew.  Can you please share how you were able to accomplish this. 

 

Thanks!

Joan

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replied on September 6, 2019

Interested as well! 

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replied on January 7, 2021

Also interested! Been trying to figure this out for too long!

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replied on September 27, 2021

Interested in this solution as well, if you can please share how you were able to accomplish this! 

 

Thanks 


Brandon!

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