• Add Stamps To Adobe Acrobat
• Add Stamps To Adobe Acrobat 9

Our team made a decision a few years back to not use TeamImage for PDF's. As a result we originally struggled with electronically tickmarking pdf's effectively and consistently across our audit team. What we did as a result was that we created an image for each tickmark in EWP and added it as a stamp in Adobe Acrobat. Then i saved my configuration in Adobe and shared that file to the rest of the team. All they had to do was place that configuration file in the C:Documents and Settingsyour user nameApplication DataAdobeAcrobat9.0Stamps folder and they now had a list of stamps (tickmarks) available for documenting their testing in the pdf. This made for more consistent approaches to documenting pdfs and allowed us to match our EWP tickmarks with those in Adobe. You can also provide a desciption with the stamp to define the tickmark in Adobe. This way when the reviewer points their cursor at the tickmark it explains its meaning.

Karl Heinz Kremer. Edit Answer (for another -39 minute) You can also use the menu View - Show/Hide - Toolbar Items - Customize Quick Tools. To automatically add the tools you use frequently to the toolbar (this is new), go to menu View - Show/Hide - Toolbar Items - Show Recently Used Tools. Almir R V Santos. Please specify a reason: Spam. One user on your team would add that image as a stamp in Adobe Acrobat. After entering that check mark stamp to Acrobat that user would share their configuration file for Acrobat with the team and they would insert the file into the location I noted above. Now whenever they open a pdf they have the option to select the checkmark as a stamp.

Very simply, an example would be for you to create an image of a check mark that looks the same as the check mark tickmark in EWP. One user on your team would add that image as a stamp in Adobe Acrobat. After entering that check mark stamp to Acrobat that user would share their configuration file for Acrobat with the team and they would insert the file into the location I noted above. Now whenever they open a pdf they have the option to select the checkmark as a stamp. If you get creative you can add 'dynamic stamps' which when selected from the list of stamps in the pdf menu the user be prompted to enter information into a text box and then it will insert that text into the selected spot in the document. For instance, if you select the stamp 'Purpose' a prompt asking you to define the documents purpose will show up and when you click okay it will enter your purpose description into the pdf.

I would be happy to share details of how this works should you have furhter questions.

• Installation Basics
• Installation Instructions
  • Macintosh Specific Steps

Background

A PDF Stamp is a type of PDF markup (comment), just like a rubber ink stamp for paper. And like a rubber stamp, a PDF stamp has a custom graphic/image. In Adobe Acrobat/Reader and most other PDF viewers, that custom image is a page in a special kind of PDF file, called a stamp file. To add a new stamp to Acrobat's list of stamps, that stamp file has to be installed into Acrobat. If you are making your own static stamp with the Acrobat stamp tools, then Acrobat does the installation for you. But if you acquired a stamp file from somewhere else, or want to share a stamp you've created, then it gets more complicated. It's not difficult, but there are a few steps you need to follow. These steps are similar, but different for the Macintosh and Windows platforms.

Installation Basics

Windows vs. Macintosh

Acrobat Professional and Acrobat Reader are nearly identical on both platforms. Both have the same menus and tool buttons, so the Stamp and Commenting tools are accessed in the same way. They even look the same on both platforms. And in both, a stamp file is installed by copying it into one of two file system folders, the user folder or the app folder. One other similarity is that the user folder doesn't exist when Acrobat/Reader is first installed. But while the Acrobat/Reader applications are similar, the file systems on each platform are very different, and this is where the details of stamp file installation get a little complicated (on both platforms). We'll cover the details below. But first we'll look at the differences between the two folders.

App vs. User Folder

Characteristic	App Folder	User Folder
Location	Sub-folder of the Acrobat/Reader installation area.	Sub-folder of the user area.
Availability	All users on the system, but only on Acrobat or Reader, not both.	Only specific user, but in both Acrobat and Reader.
Specific Difficulty	Requires administrative privilege to access. Often hidden from users.	Does not exist on initial Acrobat/Reader install. Often hidden from users.

Acrobat/Reader comes with a standard set of stamps, which are placed in the app folder. You can place your own stamps in the App folder as well, but as shown in the table above, you'll need administrative privileges on the system.

Alternatively, when the Acrobat/Reader tools are used to create a new stamp, that stamp is automatically placed in the user folder.

The Stamp Tools

All of the stamp tools are available from the 'Stamp' toolset/toolbar (Figure 1).The first stamp tool is the categorized list (dropdown menu) of stamps. This is where you select the stamp to be placed on a PDF page. The stamp categories are not randomly placed. The Stamps at the top of the list are all from stamp files in the user folder, and stamps at the bottom of the list are all from stamp files in the app folder.The next tool, the 'Stamp Palette,' is another way to select stamps for placement, but it also contains a button for importing stamps (not shown). This button is just a shortcut to the 'Create' option on the 'Custom Stamps' tool (also not shown). My general rule is to never use these options for importing, creating, or managing stamps unless absolutely necessary. The reason I don't is that these tools are used to manage stamp appearances, not stamp files. If there is anything special about a particular stamp file, these tools will destroy it. The most obvious case for this issue is dynamic stamps. Dynamic stamps contains fields and scripts for dynamically generating data, such as a date to display on the stamp. Other less obvious reasons are that a stamp may need to maintain its name because it is used in a script, or the stamp file contains special instructions or licensing for the stamp. A stamp file may also contain several stamps as a set, whereas the stamp tools will only import a single stamp image at a time.

So, there are several reasons to avoid the Acrobat stamp management tools. They cannot be used to reliably install a stamp, and in fact may cause irreversible damage to stamp files. That is why we need the following instructions.

Installation Instructions

• How to Install a PDF Stamp into Acrobat/Reader on Windows - While this video tutorial is focused on Windows installation, the first part provides valuable information about stamps for both Mac and Win platforms.

The first step for installing a stamp file is to locate the folder in which you want to install it, the user or app folder. The standard locations for these folders are well known, so if you just want to know what it is then skip to the platform specific section below. But let's look first at the standard methodology for getting the exact location. This method is the same for both Window and Macintosh, which is to use the app.getPath() JavaScript function.Open the Acrobat Console Window and run one of the two lines of code below.

Each line will return the Platform Independent path to the specified folder. However, as stated earlier, if you've never created a stamp in Acrobat or Reader, then the user folder won't exist and the first line of code will throw an exception as shown in Figure 2 below.

The solution is to use the Acrobat/Reader 'Custom Stamps...' tool discussed above in the Stamp Tools section. This is one of those cases where it is safe and acceptable to use the Stamp Tools. In the process of creating the stamp, Acrobat/Reader will also create the user stamp folder.

The next and final step is to copy the stamp file into the chosen folder, and this is where it can become difficult. On both platforms it may be necessary for you to have administrative privileges in order to access, or make system modifications to access, these folders. If you do not have administrative privilege, then you may need to get someone who does to perform the installation.
Now let's look at how the specific stamp locations are accessed on each platform.

Windows Specific Steps

The stamp folders on the Windows platform are:

App Folder on Acrobat Professional DC
C:Program Files (x86)AdobeAcrobat DCAcrobatplug_insAnnotationsStamps

App Folder on Acrobat Reader DC
C:Program Files (x86)AdobeAcrobat Reader DCReaderplug_insAnnotationsStamps

User Folder
C:Users[..user name..]AppDataRoamingAdobeAcrobatDC/Stamps

App Folder

The app folder is the easiest to locate because it is not normally hidden from the user's view. Notice that the first part of the path, /C/Program Files (x86)/Adobe/Acrobat DC/Acrobat is the Acrobat Professional DC installation area. If you have a different version of Acrobat, then 'DC' will be replaced by the number for that version. The drive letter may also be different if Acrobat is installed on a different hard drive. But otherwise, the path is consistent across different versions of both Acrobat and Windows. In fact, this same pattern holds for Acrobat Reader. The only difference for the app folder between Acrobat and Reader is the path to the application.

The last part of the path for both Acrobat and Reader is a sub-folder of the Annotation plug-in. Stamps are a type of annotation (markup and commenting), so it makes sense for the stamps to be located in the plug-in's area. You'll notice several language sub-folders in the stamps folder. This is where Acrobat places the standard stamps that come with Acrobat/Reader. You do not need to put your stamp file into one of these. Just put it in the main stamps folder.

Add Stamps To Adobe Acrobat

User Folder

The user folder is the same for both Acrobat and Reader. A stamp file placed here is displayed in both. But while this area is not protected because it belongs to you, the user, the 'AppData' sub-folder is normally hidden and takes a little work to expose. Windows is initially setup to hide anything from the user that could cause problems if accidentally modified. It is unfortunate that Adobe selected one of these areas to place not only the stamp folder, but many other types of settings and configuration parameters. To expose the user folder we'll need to change this.

First, bring up the Windows File Explorer and display the menus by pressing the 'Alt' key (Figure 3).

Next, select the 'Folder options...' entry from the 'Tools' menu (Figure 3 above) to display the 'Folder Options' dialog, Figure 4 below.

On the 'View' tab of this dialog you'll find the options you need to expose not just the hidden folders, but also file extensions and hidden files. If you do any kind of detailed work with Acrobat you'll need to uncheck all of the options that hide file system information, as shown in Figure 4.

Now you can copy a stamp file into the user stamps folder, or find an existing stamp in that folder (Figure 5).

Macintosh Specific Steps

The stamp folders on the Macintosh platform are:

App Folder on Acrobat Pro DC
/Macintosh HD/Applications/Adobe Acrobat DC/Adobe Acrobat.app/Contents/
Plugins/Comments.acroplugin/Contents/Resources/Stamps

App Folder on Acrobat Reader DC
/Macintosh HD/Applications/Adobe Acrobat Reader DC.app/Contents/
Plugins/Comments.acroplugin/Contents/Resources/Stamps

User Folder
/Macintosh HD/Users/[..user name..]/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Acrobat/DC/Stamps

App Folder

The folder paths for both Acrobat and Reader are quite long, but these folders are easy to find. Notice that the first part of each path leads to the Contents area for each application. The Contents area for any file on a Mac file system is actually inside the file. It's as if every file on a Mac is a zip file with lots of other files and folders hidden inside.
To expose the Contents:

1. Select the Acrobat or Reader application (do not double click, just click once).
2. Either click on the Settings menu or Right click on the application to expose the Settings Menu (Figure 6).
3. Select Show Package Contents from the menu.

These actions will expose a whole new file system inside the application. Now you can navigate through the second part of the path to the 'Stamps' folder.

You'll notice that the app stamps folder contains several language folders (Figure 7). This is where the language specific versions of the standard Acrobat stamps are placed. However, your stamp does not need to be put in any of these folders. Put stamp files into the main Stamps folder.

User Folder

/Macintosh HD/Users/[..user name..]/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Acrobat/DC/Stamps

The user folder is the same for both Acrobat and Reader. A stamp file placed here is displayed in both. But while this area is not protected because it belongs to you, the user, many of the Library sub-folders are normally hidden. Depending on the variation of the Mac OS, there some different techniques for exposing these hidden folders. Not all techniques work for all variations

Method #1

1. In the Finder select the 'Go > Go to folder' menu item.
2. In the dialog box enter ~/Library.
3. Click the 'Go' button to display the Library folder in the Finder

Method #2

1. Hold down the 'Apple Option' key and click on the 'Go' menu
2. The Library will now appear on the folder listing on the Go menu. Click on it to open in the Finder.

Method #3

Add Stamps To Adobe Acrobat 9

1. Open the /Macintosh HD/Applications/Utilities/Terminal.app' application. This is a command line window.
2. Enter chflags nohidden ~/Library on the command line and hit return.
3. Now the Library will be permanently displayed on the 'favorites' section of the Finder.