The Uniform Resource Locator or URL syntax supports multiple resource types in addition to “http:” such as “ftp:”, “tel:” and “mailto:” and PDF forms developers have made use of that fact to make their jobs easier.
Many forms developers create buttons like the ones on the left to mail a document to the next person in a workflow. This button uses the “Sumbit a form” action. The URL that the form gets submitted to starts with “mailto:” which causes Adobe Acrobat or the Adobe Reader to create a mail message with the current document as an attachment.
Most of the time this method works just fine. However, if you need more than one of those buttons on your form, your end user might see a security warning because Acrobat thinks that they are submitting information to more than one web site, a common phishing technique. Fortunately, there is a simple JavaScript that can be used to mail documents without using the “Submit a form” action and causing a security warning.
When using this script, even in the full article example, when trying to skip a field the pop-up gets stuck. It seems the script sees the action of trying to close the pop-up message as trying to click out of the required field and instantly gives another pop-up, which also must be closed before continuing. The only way out is to force close the application and try to start over.
The button is designed to open an email message. Acrobat and Reader will wait until the email message is either sent or otherwise closed – it’s possible that on your system, the email message is opening up behind Acrobat. Try alt-tabbing and looking for it.