Can a .pdf talk to Excel?

[Gingertrees]

I was creating a form in Excel:
BusinessName:___________________________________
Address:___________________________City:__________ (etc)

I'll be compiling the results into a larger spreadsheet or table.

...and I realized this would be better as a .pdf form (that's an option, since I have both full Acrobat and LiveCycle Designer 8). Then I thought, "I wonder if it's possible to export form data from a .pdf to an Excel spreadsheet (or Access table)." And I thought maybe my helpful online friends at MrExcel might know... so, guys? Yea or nay?

I've found surprisingly little about this on the Adobe forums or elsewhere online. There are a couple old similar questions like this on the board, none of them answered, but I thought maybe I'd take a stab at it. Anybody know if this is possible? Or is this a case where it's possible but inadvisable?

 

[Shawnyv]

It's been a while since I looked into it, but I believe that it is possible to export PDF form data to a CSV, yes. I remember a couple years ago looking into a project that would auto-scrape data from hundreds of PDF forms for processing in excel.

I don't think it can read directly from the PDF, though - I believe you have to use a function within Acrobat to export the form data as a CSV

 

[Ackerma Image]

some pdf processing program can do this...