Upgrade from Adobe LiveCycle - Business Decisiosn 6.0 or Adobe AEM?

0
votes

As you all know, Adobe stopped support on LiveCycle ES4 (which we use to design XFA/dynamic PDF forms).

We're trying to upgrade, but we have two solutions:

  1. Business Decisions 6.0 (already installed on our servers and usable) https://documentation.decisions.com/docs/introduction-to-decisions

  2. Adobe Experience Manager https://www.adobe.com/marketing/experience-manager.html

I'm looking at both, and have trained a bit in Decisions and this is what I've found:

Decisions:

  • steep learning curve
  • can connect to SQL databases and display data
  • forms are usually displayed in a URL and the user cannot save the form as a PDF to their Desktop to reopen and save again
  • documentation on functionality is not as explanatory as we would like

AEM

  • contains the same functionality and UI as LiveCycle ES4
  • can import XFA from LiveCycle to AEM seamlessly
  • Adobe offers thorough documentation on functionality

I wish to use AEM, but we may not if Business Decisions can do the same thing as AEM. So I'm asking this group for advice.

If we're used to programming and designing PDFs through LiveCycle ES4:

  1. Which software will be an easier transition for training (i.e. we're going to hit the ground running)? Decisions or AEM?
  2. Which software offers everything LiveCycle can do and more? Decisions or AEM?
  3. Any stories to share on your experience with Decisions or AEM?

Thank you. We're trying to gauge which software will suit our needs from LiveCycle the best with the least hassle.

1
pdfaemlivecycle-designer

1 Answers

0
votes

AEM Forms (JEE) is a direct upgrade to LC ES4 and you will not see much of a difference between the two. What you will notice is better HTML support and a more mature implementation of Adaptive Forms. If you want to stick with PDF and you've already got orchestrations and form templates developed then it's a no-brainer to stick with AEM. This is especially true if you've kept up with your M&S and you aren't faced with a making the large financial investment in the licensing.

Note that there are two flavours of AEM now: JEE and OSGi. You'll want the JEE version as it's the same as LiveCycle. The OSGi version is a different beast and it doesn't do much with XFA and it doesn't do orchestrations/processes very well.

I hope this helps even though it's 2 months late! Fred