Comments on: Creating QuickBooks Invoices with Adobe Acrobat Pro

By: Harley Davis

Harley Davis — Wed, 30 Mar 2011 17:18:27 +0000

I work as a freelance technical service and support tech. I do some basic software training, and I’ve found a few problems like this popping up with different software. It’s not just a problem with adobe. Yeah, they could make it easier to utilize the typing methods, but that’s not the real problem. If you have thousands of items, there’s almost no way to keep track of them in adobe and allow them to be entered easily. You can try the following… Check to see that your list in QB is in alphabetical order. If not, it creates a problem for any import export operation. If the list isn’t alphabetical, exporting the programming to adobe Might not magically sort it for you. If the number of items is constantly changing, you’re stuck again. You’ll have to update everybody’s listings over and over. Which is more difficult? Starting over with a new datafile and trying to import your old data wo you can use an alphabetical list that won’t stay alphabetical, or using a number system instead, which you have to give some kind of listing for so whoever uses the form knows what they are entering? Better way: Hide the item box behind another box… …A text box. Type items in Quickbooks with all one case… …either all caps or all lowercase. Use javascript on the textbox to convert what’s typed to all that case, then check it against a text based item list embedded as a page javasript string array or structure that has already been sorted (use excel to alphabetize, but give a number with it that coresponds to the item list placement and place a copy of both of those fields in their own structure. Run a binary search tree on the text structure, and make sure to keep track of the index of the array. When you find a match, use the index to call the index of the number structure, use the number at the given index to seed the item list box with an index, hide the text box and show the item list box. Put quotes around your text in excel, and you’ll be able to copy, paste, and make a csv, open in a simple text editor, select all, copy paste over the text in the embedded data structure, and easily update your form as your item lists change. Just some copy and paste work (1 hour maximum). I’d give out the javascript here if I was really good with it, unfortunately the JScript and I have only a hi and Bye passing familiarity. I know some people who say it can be done, if you know how to work within java and javascript. I don’t have much knowledge of Java. Procedural C, C++ and some basic Java. I can work with algorithmic design pretty well though. I’m great with basic logic, just not the connection to code (not a great memory for linguistics; and code is language). I am doing some work with it though. Hopefully, in the near future I can provide you with all of it (YES FREE!!! I work on a mac, fix some WINPC and sometimes help guys with logic for coding or wrapping programs from WINPC for UNIX; I don’t make a lot of $$ as a freelancer, so I’m a big fan of FREE or OPEN solutions).

By: Charlie

Charlie — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 21:17:27 +0000

I doubt that Adobe is going to update this feature, although I can’t say for sure. It uses the SDK, and Intuit is trying to push developers a different direction. And Adobe hasn’t seen a lot of interest in this. I’ve not heard anything from Adobe about this for a long time.

The issue with the Canadian version would have to do with the Adobe side of things, SDK applications can be set to treat the Canadian version differently, and it sounds like Adobe didn’t make their program flexible enough to accomodate that.

By: Genaro

Genaro — Fri, 03 Dec 2010 16:39:16 +0000

Just in case any Canadians are reading this, it doesn’t work for the Canadian Edition of Quickbooks :*( spent hours trying to make it work without success. QB doesn’t recognize the connection.(QB Pro 2011 and Adobe Pro 9)

If this ever changes in the future please post a reply to this comment. Thanks!

By: Charlie

Charlie — Mon, 04 May 2009 20:36:58 +0000

Jonathan: I believe that you have to edit the template, but I haven’t played with that aspect of things. The resulting form has database information in it, and you have to be careful when editing that. They may lock it down to prevent fraud. But I haven’t played with it.

By: Jonathan W

Jonathan W — Mon, 04 May 2009 15:54:36 +0000

Charlie-

This was very helpful. Although i have run into a bit of a snag you might be able to help with. I have customized the invoice and proposals we use in quickbooks. I have them saved as PDF’s. When i open them up in adobe, they cant be edited. Im guessing then that only the templates that are in the adobe program files can actually be edited and sent out. If its possible to use our own form in adobe, i would love to know how to do it. Thank you.

By: Charlie

Charlie — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 16:03:59 +0000

CJ: I think so, although I’m not sure. The problem is that it would be a fairly complicated thing to set up. You don’t have a good example to start with, so you would have to do a lot of “programming” work in Adobe to get that to work.

By: CJ

CJ — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 15:16:09 +0000

Charlie –

Great article and web site. Thanks for all the help. Would it be possible to use the adobe forms as a timesheet for employees to track time against different clients/customers?

Thanks

By: Charlie

Charlie — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 02:10:08 +0000

John, you can contact me directly at the email address in the “about” link at the top of this page. I do work with Adobe forms, but I’m finding that more often than not we end up writing a custom QB program rather than using the Adobe forms. Adobe integration is expensive and complicated, and it only makes sense if you are distributing forms out to people who don’t have ready access to the QB company file.

By: John Beem

John Beem — Tue, 28 Apr 2009 01:40:51 +0000

Do you know of any consultants (possibly yourself) who can design new Adobe Forms to integrate with QuickBooks. We are trying to automate check requests and Petty Cash reconciliations. As you say it is quite complicated, and while I could, theoretically learn how to do it myself, I am not going to do it often enough to get good at it.

By: Charlie

Charlie — Thu, 23 Apr 2009 16:12:44 +0000

Tim, you can’t just shift things around, you have to use the features they have built into Adobe to manage the QB database. It is very complicated, because they are just using the standard QB SDK programming interface and that is itself very complicated to understand. I doubt that Adobe is going to do much to improve this, although I can’t say that for sure.