God I hate pdf files

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okay, I understand it retains fonts and graphs and stuff where ever you send it, but I'm really in the dark as to what good this program really is.

I get emailed pdf files and sometimes it seems so counterproductive.

For instance, I'll get emailed a form in pdf and if I could edit it I could make it more specific for my needs, and the needs of others I forward to.

yes, yes, I only have acrobat reader, I guess I could purchase the software to write or edit, but it would just be easier if it was already in a format everyone could use.

Sometimes I'll get stuff in pdf that doesn't even have graphs or anything fancy....it could have be done just as well in word or excel or pp.

So, in laymans terms, what the big deal about pdf?

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some people are deathly afraid that the recipient will alter their precious document, hence the pdf.

i hate them because they take forever to print -- our printers are constantly tied up...

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Well, here's one:

Say you create something (e.g., a poster, newsletter or ad) that you want others to see. You used design software (PageMaker or In Design) that not everyone has. By creating a pdf, you can email everyone your creation--and they can all see it!

I do this all the time to share drafts and final versions of designs. It's cool...

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Right D'art, that's what I meant when I said retains fonts and graphs and stuff...

Yeah reg, they do take a while to print.

That's kinda what I mean...You can always protect a file so that it's read only, but be able to put fields in it so that someone could fill in the blanks.

Any editing I had to do on files sent from on high would be to make it more user friendly for those I'm going to roll it out to.

Many times there's no graphics or anything worth protecting.

Sometimes it's like they use it because they have it.

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I don't understand; Why is God sending you pdf files again?

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The simplest way we've to send quotations everywhere with company logo and so on is sending a pdf file.

As RP said we are afraid people could modify our papers.

Pdf files do not avoid that but makes it more difficult to modify.

On the other hand, we have the software to write and modify the pdf files.

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ebrown_p wrote:

I don't understand; Why is God sending you pdf files again?

Because apparantly I have done something to really piss him off. Shocked

Yeah Francisk, I understand about the logos and all....it sure doesn't make it easier to work with the document though.

Once I made up a flow chart of a process, 95% of it would have applied to everyone in the company. There were only a few places where individual regions may have wanted to tweak it for their needs.

I sent it to the department that handled the area the flow chart was about, giving them permission to share it with everyone.

Well, they did, they took my exact work and scanned it into pdf, and sent it out company wide....

Well farging great, now no one had an opportunity to pass it on to the end users with the editing that would have made sense to their particular area.

In other words, I guess my question is...

Why would someone put something in pdf that didn't have anything worth protecting...it just makes more work for others who have to recreate the wheel.

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One of the problems that people experience with pdf files online is that the damed Adobe software now goes looking for updates every damned time you try to open a pdf file. This can lock-up or even crash your system if you are using dial-up, and the damned thing doesn't query you first, it only queries you if it finds an update--which is too damned late because your system will already be locked-up--you couldn't download and install the update if you wanted to.

I hate it when people post pdf files in threads here. But for all other purposes, and especially email, d'Art is right, that format makes the most sense.

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Dammit, I say we infiltrate all those adobes with acrobats living in them and, and.....

well, I don't know where my plan will go from there.

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just having a vague plan is sufficient for now...

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PDF (Portable Document Format) is used to create true to life views of files at a small file size. Images are resampled to a lower resolution and, fonts embeded, anybody can open it.

If it is taking to long to print then the maker of the pdf isn't making it correctly. Most pdfs, even image intensive, should be around 2-4mb.

They are not meant to be edited although you can if you have Adobe Acrobat Pro.

Pdfs are also useful for marking up and making notes for files still in progress. It saves paper. Is easy to send/read. and is fast.

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jp is right. I suspect there is some confusion re when to send a pdf vs sending, say, a Word document.

If I want someone's edits, I send him or her a a Word document...

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I hate Word documents more than any of you hate PDF documents.

Word documents are a proprietary format that can contain viruses. They also have privacy issues since you can delete a paragraph from your document that you don't want me to see, but I can often get that paragraph (as well as many other things you have deleted and edited) since they are stored in the file.

I prefer Open Office format or even html (or even just text). Open office is not only an open format, it cleaner and smaller than Word files.

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Setanta wrote:

One of the problems that people experience with pdf files online is that the damed Adobe software now goes looking for updates every damned time you try to open a pdf file. This can lock-up or even crash your system if you are using dial-up, and the damned thing doesn't query you first, it only queries you if it finds an update--which is too damned late because your system will already be locked-up--you couldn't download and install the update if you wanted to.

I hate it when people post pdf files in threads here. But for all other purposes, and especially email, d'Art is right, that format makes the most sense.

*nods* I open Acrobat Reader and disable the atuo-check feature (It's under "Edit" and then "Preferences") just so that it doesn't do that. IMO, the default setting for it should be "Off". It's a PITA feature.

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I don't know if you've experienced this, Fishin', but i've had the reader reset its own preference, had it "re-enable" the auto-check.

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I'm with ebrown... viruses are the main reason people use pdfs to distribute simple documents. That, and office jerks who rewrite and change the meaning.

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Has anyone else here tried OpenOffice. It is open source, but it is supported by IBM and Sun so a lot of resources have gone into making it professional.

It reads and write Word Documents (I use it professionally). The only thing it has trouble with is advanced formatting with combined Text and images, but most documents are just fine.

It is a mature, professional Word Processer that does everything most people want as well, or better than Word. It also doesn't have viruses and can write ODF files (which is the standard docuement format supported by everyone but Microsoft).

Best of all, it is available for free. I don't know why anyone would shell out the $300 for the inferior Microsoft product. Monopolies suck.

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PDF files are quite simply the main reason for the technological leap at the heart of the current printing industry revolution, making direct-to-plate printing possible. PDF files enable vendors to skip the time-consuming and costly step of creating film for every print job, which then saves money and time for all whose livelihoods depend on this fun and exciting industry.

It isn't an exaggeration to say that for some people, PDF files are the very thing that sustains them, quite literally the lifeblood that feeds their families and nourishes their lives. PDF files are cool.

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Quote:

If it is taking to long to print then the maker of the pdf isn't making it correctly. Most pdfs, even image intensive, should be around 2-4mb.

we see them in the print queues, churning at a snail's pace.
these are engineers printing them, so i've no doubt they're doing it wrong somehow.
"just press a button" is the prevailing attitude in my place...

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kickycan wrote:

PDF files are quite simply the main reason for the technological leap at the heart of the current printing industry revolution, making direct-to-plate printing possible. PDF files enable vendors to skip the time-consuming and costly step of creating film for every print job, which then saves money and time for all whose livelihoods depend on this fun and exciting industry.

It isn't an exaggeration to say that for some people, PDF files are the very thing that sustains them, quite literally the lifeblood that feeds their families and nourishes their lives. PDF files are cool.

Oh, I understand that....and everything everyone else has said....

It's just that perhaps some discretion should be used in choosing which software to write something in....sometimes it's really overkill when it's something that really doesn't need to be protected, Like inter-corporation stuff that is meant to be used, not just read.

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God I hate pdf files

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