[Tex/LaTex] hyperref fillable forms – breaking the rules

formshyperref

The hyperref manual states clearly:

You must put your fields inside a Form environment (only one per file).

However,

  1. I can put form fields outside of a Form and

  2. I can put more than one Form in a file

and it seems to work just fine (apart from the general problem even within the rules that the font in the fillable fields seems uncontrollable). See MWE. It is not possible for me to get all my fillable bits in one place. What terrible things will befall me if I breach (1) and (2) above?

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{hyperref}
\begin{document}

%outside a form
\TextField[name=one, width=3cm, borderwidth=0]{type here:}

%Form 1
\begin{Form}
\TextField[name=two, width=3cm, borderwidth=0]{type here:} \\

\TextField[name=three, width=3cm, borderwidth=0]{type here:} \\
\end{Form}

%And another one
\begin{Form}
\TextField[name=four, width=3cm, borderwidth=0]{type here:} \\

\TextField[name=five, width=3cm, borderwidth=0]{type here:} \\
\end{Form}
\end{document}

Best Answer

This is not a complete answer, but small subtle things seem to happen/break.

For example, let's say that you are creating a PDF document, but that you don't provide a Form environment at all. If you use Adobe Acrobat Reader DC (version 2015.007.20033) to read your generated document, then when you enter your first character the whole GUI freezes approximately one second for some reason (but after that everything seems to work fine). If you instead use Foxit Reader (version 7.1.5.425) you will not get the notification saying "This document contains interactive form fields." that the program usually displays.

So it seems best to follow the manual, as other PDF readers might break in other ways.