Guidelines for Editing Metadata Page 23 of 32
Note: Adobe Acrobat Pro provides a feature (Action Wizard) that can be used to automate tasks,
including the removal of metadata (Remove Hidden Information).
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https://helpx.adobe.com/acrobat/using/action-wizard-acrobat-pro.html.
Creating Action to Automate Removal of Metadata - Adobe Acrobat Pro DC (Action Wizard)
1. Click Tools on the top-left of the screen.
2. Scroll down to Customize section and click Action Wizard option. This displays the Action
Wizard toolbar.
3. Click New Action option. This opens the Create New Action dialog box.
4. Under Choose tools to add, click Protection, select Remove Hidden Information, and click
add icon (Figure 26). This will list Remove Hidden Information under Action steps to show.
5. Under Remove Hidden Information, uncheck Prompt User, and click Specify Settings.
This displays the Remove Hidden Information dialog box (Figure 27).
a. If Prompt User is checked, users will be asked to specify which information types
to remove for each file processed. Unless your documents contain various types
of information that need to be processed differently, it is recommended that
Prompt User be uncheck.
6. By default, all information types are selected for removal. Uncheck any information type
you want to keep. It is recommended that form fields (allows users to complete forms)
and overlapping objects (enables text search capabilities) be unchecked. When finished,
click OK.
a. If documents contain links, then consider also unchecking Links, actions and
javascripts.
7. Under Choose tools to add, click Save & Export, select Save, and click add icon (Figure 28).
This will list Save under Action steps to show.
8. Under Save, click Specify Settings. This displays the Output Options dialog box (Figure
29). This allows you to indicate how files should be saved once processed. It is
recommended that you define a naming convention for processed files, such as adding
“_final” at the end of the original file name (e.g., filename_final), and saving document as
PDFs. Click OK.
9. Optional. To save processed files in a designated folder, click Save, and select Save to
Local Folder. This displays the Browse For Folder dialog box. Select desired folder and
click OK.
10. Select files to process. Default is to process currently open file. If you want to process
files from a designated folder, click the Folder icon. This displays the Browse For Folder
dialog box. Select desired folder and click OK (Figure 31).
a. If folder was selected (previous step), then anytime this action is used, processed
files will be saved to the designated folder using the naming convention defined
in step 8
b. If no folder is selected, anytime this action is used, files processed will be saved in
the same location the original files are saved.
11. Click Save. This displays the Save Action dialog box. Enter action name and description
for action. Click Save.
12. New action (Remove Metadata) now appears on the Actions List pane on the right-side of
the screen.