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Show HN: PDF Otter – Fill in PDFs Online and API

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Re: Show HN: PDF Otter – Fill in PDFs Online and API

#31

Post by mariusz331 »

CGamesPlay wrote: post #25

I work at a company that has a pretty comprehensive suite of PDF templates we fill out, so if you want some feedback from someone who would have been a perfect customer 3 years ago: The biggest thing that costs us time is schema validation. We ended up building a tool that rejects uploads if the text fields don't match, or if you forget to include a radio option, etc. It also has "recommended" fields which issue warn…

This is great feedback. I really like your ideas on schema validation. We faced a similar problem at my last company and I have some thoughts to improve it with PDF Otter. Thank you!

Re: Show HN: PDF Otter – Fill in PDFs Online and API

#36

Post by rubidium »

mariusz331 wrote: post #17
ijustdontcare wrote: post #14

I don't get it. What advantage does this service have over using a pdf library to insert additional text? Why do I need an external server for this text insertion task?

You can use a library to insert text in a PDF but you need to figure out at what coordinates to position the text and how you want the text styled. If you are constantly adding PDF templates, this is cumbersome work. If you don't have a tool for figuring out the coordinates (like the editor on pdfotter.com), your developers will have to do this. The last company I worked at faced this exact problem and it took us hou…

You do have a strong competitor in this space. Adobe. Which is admittedly costly for the the pro version, but can't be ignored. Why use PDF otter over them?

Re: Show HN: PDF Otter – Fill in PDFs Online and API

#37

Post by kanzure »

mariusz331 wrote: post #30
nemo1618 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have an photo of a handwritten signature that I use in Adobe. They do a pretty good job of extracting the signature contours from the photo. I've also seen a (much crappier) version of this on my mobile banking app, for processing photos of checks. They basically just blow up the contrast until only the blackest part of the image remains. It looks awful, but it might be a good place to iterate from. If you implemen…

Thanks for all this great info. We do have a font option called 'Dancing Script' available now which can make your text look like a signature. I'll do some more research on e-signatures, though. I assume there's more to it than just changing your text's font.

well, you should consider doing actual cryptographic signatures over the document, plus timestamping like via https://opentimestamps.org/

Re: Show HN: PDF Otter – Fill in PDFs Online and API

#38

Post by mariusz331 »

rubidium wrote: post #36
mariusz331 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can use a library to insert text in a PDF but you need to figure out at what coordinates to position the text and how you want the text styled. If you are constantly adding PDF templates, this is cumbersome work. If you don't have a tool for figuring out the coordinates (like the editor on pdfotter.com), your developers will have to do this. The last company I worked at faced this exact problem and it took us hou…

You do have a strong competitor in this space. Adobe. Which is admittedly costly for the the pro version, but can't be ignored. Why use PDF otter over them?

For filling in individual PDFs, yes, Adobe wins. However, I'm using the editor on my site to show off the PDF Otter API which helps you fill-in PDFs at scale. That's a tool that Adobe doesn't provide and how PDF Otter will earn money. I'm sorry that it's poorly advertised. I'm working on improving the homepage's copy and making it easier to transition from the demo to using the API.

Re: Show HN: PDF Otter – Fill in PDFs Online and API

#39

Post by NKCSS »

mariusz331 wrote: post #2

Hi HN. I built PDF Otter to solve a headache my last company faced. We needed to fill in PDF contracts repeatedly and there was no service out there that did that, so we had to build something in-house. We couldn't use [hello/docu]sign because sending users there lowered our conversion rates. The PDF Otter API powers the PDF editor advertised on the homepage. The editor is simple but I think its better than similar s…

Why not use Crystal Reports? I know it's a pain in the ass, but afaik it's still the best thing to do to generate PDF's and you have full control.
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