PDF Software

Create a Post
A

Amy McCray

SGF, Supreme Grumble Framer
Joined
Dec 3, 2002
Posts
2,780
Loc
North Prairie, WI
Anyone use a PDF software that they particularly like or dislike? Retail and/or freeware.

Thanks!

OOps! Mods please move to Software Forum. Sorry about that.
 
I use CutePDF (freeware) to make anything into a PDF file. They have a Mac version too.

VERY easy to use, once you install it, it shows up as a printer in every application you have. You just print to it, and voila, you have a PDF file.
 
Bullzip is another free one that simulates a printer driver and captures the output to a PDF.

If its a document, I use the built in PDF generator in OpenOffice suite.

The read them I use the free Adobe Reader.
 
I'm looking for something I can use to edit a pdf doc. Will those do that?
 
Amy McCray said:
I'm looking for something I can use to edit a pdf doc. Will those do that?
Click to expand...

No. But...............let's say you created a document in Word and made it into a PDF file as Mike and I described above.

You can make changes to that Word document and re create it (print it) as a PDF file again. Very fast and very handy,
 
No. Most of them are just pictures/images. However, if you had the original document used to create the pdf - you could.

If it's something simple that you wish to change, you can do it in photoshop or an image editor.

Note also that some pdf's have been set up to have editable fields, such as a form or application.

Mike
 
Ok, here's the situation. I created a brochure in Word but was unable to get Word to do some things, like ignore the margin/header/footer spacing. Even started completely over making sure I had never gone into header/footer in the first place.

The problem came with a top and bottom swirly border that I inserted but Word would not let me put all the way to the top and bottom of the paper. It always had a small margin, which would of course, print out as white and looked stupid.

A friend of mine offered to edit the Word file using "Nitro", a pdf editing software. Great! Worked well until there were subsequent spacing issues and some other minor editing that I wanted to do. It took forever for her to do the changes and I felt like a nag asking if she had time to look at it again and again.

So I can either buy Nitro and do the changes myself - Or - use some other software which will allow me to make the changes necessary.

At this point, the original Word document is of no use unless I start from scratch again with adding the top and bottom borders that I wanted. I was hoping I could just take the latest pdf version that was done with Nitro and go from there.

Does any of that make sense?! :faintthud:
 
I don't understand the issue with Word, but you should be able to set the margins to 0.5" all around (the limitation is determined by the capabilities of the specific printer you are using)

Do you have OpenOffice installed? If so, this program will natively open a WORD document. You make the changes, and generate a PDF right in the program.

Mike
 
The issue is that I want NO margin at the top and bottom. I want the image (color) to go all the way to the top and bottom w/ no white space along the paper edge.

I have done all the adjustments possible w/ the printer (tried 2 different ones) and it is actually in the Word document. Print Preview while in Word, shows the white space at the top and bottom and printer prints out the same.

The Nitro program eliminated the problem. Guess it will be easiest to just get that and do the remaining editing from there.

Thanks!!
 
Unfortunately, no. That's a good point though. A publishing software would indeed be the most appropriate tool, wouldn't it?
 
How are you printing a document with no margin? What kind of printer is it? In the printing business this is called a full bleed, and the only way I am aware to achieve full bleed in Print work (where there is a transfer of medium to a substrate as opposed to a chemical change such as in silver halide "prints" or dye sublimation) is to use oversize paper and trim to fit; this is a very common feature in print work.

For any "normal" type of printer it's not practical to even think about printing to the actual edge of the paper, because of the precision that would be necessary to not print off the edge of the paper. That is, if you were even printing at only 300 dpi you would have to have everything within about .003"; including the width of the paper, the alignment of the paper, the indexing of the print-head, and the paper feed stepper motor; 1200 dpi would be less than .001". These things may be able to be overcome, but the average desktop printer will not have these abilities.

As others have mentioned, every printer will have its own set of restrictions, and send that data (via the printer driver) to the software, i.e. Word. The software will limit the margins you can specify based on the instructions it got from the printer driver. You can sometimes see this make changes by selecting a different printer with wider minimum margins. While in your case it appears to be the software dictating how close you can go to the edge, it is only obeying the printer driver.

True desktop publishing software such as Quark (I assume others as well) do not place such limitations on the user, as the software assumes the "professional" creator knows what they are doing. However, if you make the content go right to the edge of an 8-1/2 x 11 page, and print on 8-1/2 x 11 without any scaling, the edges of the content will be cut off at the physical limits of the printer.
 
AHA! So it IS the printer after all as far as the restrictions on my end. I knew it had something to do with it but I thought Word was the main cluprit.

In fact, the friend who was doing the editing, is also doing the printing - w/ an HP Color Laser but I do not know what model. A new one is all I know. And she is doing "full bleed" so the color is now going all the way to the edge of the 8 1/2" x 11" paper.

It works. So if I can just get the few additional things edited to my liking in some pdf editing software, I will be all set to go.
 
Amy:

If your printer accepts oversized paper, print and trim to 8.5x11!

Or maybe you could visit a friend who works for a company (they almost always have multi tray / multi paper size printers....bring her a large Latte as a reward...:p
 
Amy McCray said:
In fact, the friend who was doing the editing, is also doing the printing - w/ an HP Color Laser but I do not know what model. A new one is all I know. And she is doing "full bleed" so the color is now going all the way to the edge of the 8 1/2" x 11" paper.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure if you can, but I would try finding out what printer she has, then download and install the printer drivers for it on your computer. Select that as the printer for the document you are working on, and it should allow you to set 0.00" margins.
 
Tried that already Jim. I set them to zero, but it still doesn't allow the image to go all the way to the top. Almost, but not entirely. So evidently it is the printer that is not allowing it.

Again, right now, I'm not looking for a solution to the printing because her printer does a great job and is more cost-effective because it is a color laser. She already fixed the border issue with her editing software.

The only reason I'm really looking for suggestions for a pdf editor is to do fine tuning on the brochure contents.

But thanks for the info because it may come in handy for another project down the road.
 
I have a program that shows up on my desktop shortcut as "Free pdf to Word doc converter."

Someone here recommended it to me and I have used it once or twice.

As I recall it saved me a lot of frustration in whatever i was working on at the time.
 
Mar, do you know the name of it? Or is what's in quotes really the name of the software?
 
YOu could always go to adobe and get a free trial of photoshop or acrobat if you will not need it alot but if so suggest these, I use em everyday,
 
Full bleed is not in your page setup... it's in your print preferences.

Set the page to zero and then in your print to photo full bleed.

Nitro has a free version.... it one of the ones I use.

ALSO there is a MSWord extra... that you can down load for free to "Publish" (save as) as a "pdf".

Same with Publisher.....

are you sure it's not a Mac 7.1 issue?
 
If you mean OS 7, that was way back in the 80's or 90's. Or do you mean Word 7.1?

Could be the printer but tried on older Epson C84 and fairly new HP multi-function.
 
I get a freebie from AnyBizSoft--pdf the word(& I assume back again??) have not played with it yet(also got their passwd cracker)
 
Create a Post
Back
Top