Flatten PDF

How to flatten a PDF

Flattening makes a filled form's answers, and comments, highlights and stamps, a fixed part of the page: they look the same, but no one can change them, and portals that refuse fillable PDFs accept the file.

నింపిన ఫారం జవాబులు, కామెంట్లు పేజీలో శాశ్వత భాగమవుతాయి: ఎవరూ మార్చలేరు, పోర్టల్‌లు అంగీకరిస్తాయి.

1. Choose the PDF (a locked one opens with its password). You see what is in it: fields, comments, links, JavaScript.
2. Choose what to flatten: both, only the form fields, or only the comments; and whether to keep what shows as it prints (the start) or as on screen.
3. Tap Flatten PDF, look at the check, then download or share it.

Everything happens in your browser: the PDF is never uploaded to ap7am or anywhere else. The new file is named form-flat.pdf after yours. Keep the fillable copy if you may need to change an answer.

What happens to the form

Each box is drawn on its page exactly where and as it looks: its text, tick or dot, border and background. Then the boxes and the form itself are taken out of the file, with the answers, so nothing can be changed or read as a field. Text stays text you can select; nothing is turned into a picture.

• Telugu answers: many apps save a form's answers without a look of their own and leave the drawing to the viewer, and many viewers cannot draw Telugu. Such an answer is drawn here from its text (Noto Sans Telugu, joined correctly) so it is never lost. (This is the only part drawn as a picture.)
• A box with no look of its own, or a form that asks viewers to draw every box, is drawn first.
• As it prints leaves out what only shows on screen, such as Print and Reset buttons; as on screen keeps everything you see.

What happens to comments

Highlights, underlines, ink, shapes, stamps, sticky-note icons and text boxes are drawn on the page exactly where they were, at their size and turn (PDF 32000, 12.5.5); those with no look of their own get the one viewers give them. Hidden ones, and those set not to print when you keep what prints, are taken out without being drawn; so are the note windows (popups) and replies. A note's text is not on the page, so it goes with the note.

Left as they are, on purpose, and said:

• Links stay clickable (untick Keep links clickable to take them out);
• Redaction marks: flattening one only paints over the text, which stays underneath and can be copied out. To remove it for good, use Redact PDF;
• Attached files and media: flattening would delete them.

JavaScript (scripts that run when the PDF opens, or in its boxes and links) and the XFA version of a form are taken out too, unless you untick it; Adobe Reader's extended rights always go, as they show an error after any change.

The check

The new file is read again: it says how many fields and comments are left (none). Then every page is drawn before and after the same way and compared pixel by pixel; tap Show changes in red to see any difference. Boxes and comments that had their own look come out the same to the pixel; one drawn fresh may differ a little from how your browser showed it.

What it cannot do

• A dynamic XFA form (made with Adobe LiveCycle; only Adobe Reader can show it) has no boxes to draw: fill it in Adobe Reader and print it to PDF, then flatten that.
• A digitally signed PDF (e-Aadhaar, for example) no longer shows a valid signature after any change, flattening too: the page warns you. Keep the signed original for whoever checks it.
• A locked PDF opens with your password; the flattened one then has no password. If you gave the owner password, the same lock can be put back. A PDF whose author set limits on changes needs that owner password, as with Unlock PDF: nothing is guessed.

Questions

Made with pdf-lib (MIT licence), Mozilla's pdf.js (Apache 2.0 licence) and qpdf (Apache 2.0 licence, for locked PDFs), all running in your browser; Telugu drawn with Noto Sans Telugu from Google Fonts (SIL Open Font License). Licences.