Trouble with unprintable characters in Adobe Print form

[ralf_dillenburger]

Hi experts,

I'm trying to implement an adobe printform containing a PDF417 Barcode. To separate the datafields within the barcode, i have to use some unprinteable characters like hex 1E or 1C and so on.

I had the same issue in SMARTFORMS a few years ago, but was able to solve it in smartforms using /0x1E or /0x1C. Now I tried the same in Adobe Forms, but there comes an error in SM21 (syslog), telling me, that there was a problem during a Render operation. (Processing exception during a "Render" operation... A problem was encountered with the results: RenderResult array is null.)

I tried to use this coding as well:

  data: zrecsep type c.

field-symbols: <f>.
label_data_barcode-recsep   = '1E'. "recsep is type x
ASSIGN label_data_barcode-recsep to <f> CASTING TYPE C.
move <f> to zrecsep.
clear <f>.

After that, zrecsep contains '#', but in hex the correct value '1E'.

This coding works for all printable characters, such as hex 66 for 'f' or hex 5B for '[', but not for unrintable characters like hex 1E. In case of an unprintable character, a new syslog entry appears.

Any ideas?

Many thanks

Ralf

[ralf_dillenburger]

Hi, it's me again

Here is the answer of the SAP support:

unfortunatelly this control character is not supported by the XML
standard and the data in the SOAP request is delivered in XML format to
the ADS. Therefore such character cannot be used.
I can only suggest the following web page:
Link: [http://www.w3.org/International/questions/qa-controls#further]

I then asked another question:

Is there any other possibility to generate the pdf417 barcode and use
it inside the pdf form? For example: Is it possible, to generate the
barcode-image before calling the ADS-function and submit the address of
the image instead of the string for the barcode?

answer:

I understand that you don't want to print out the string value. But it
works as follows: the template (which contains the empty label
definition) and the data (which contains the value for the label) are
sent to ADS and on ADS side will the label generated.
Therefore it is also not possible with ADS that you create the label
befor sending it to ADS.
The only thing I can imagine that you create the label with an external
program and you insert it into the template as an image. But I don't
know if it is possible for you.

Conclusion: There is definitely no chance to use such characters in Adobe print forms due to the XML standard which is used to process the data inside the ADS.

In my case, i have to use SMARTFORMS technology to create the label with a pdf417 barcode containing these special characters.

regards

Ralf

[Techouest_B]

Hello,

You've got the solution for ADOBE on this wiki

http://wiki.scn.sap.com/wiki/display/Community/UPS+maxicode+on+SAP+Adobe+forms

Have a nice day

François