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Hi
Everyone,
formally
know as Acrobat Reader, it is made by Adobe.
Adobe
Reader is free software used for viewing and printing Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF) files on
major hardware and operating system platforms. Adobe Reader 7.0 is the
newest version of the familiar Adobe Acrobat® Reader software.
There
may have been documents you have downloaded and couldn't open, or a file
attached to an e-mail? Well if it had the letters ".pdf" at the
end of the file's name then you would have needed Adobe Reader to open it.
Because
it is a "Read Only" format, i.e. you can't type into it or alter
it, it is becoming the preferred document format of businesses,
solicitors, web-sites, and manuals of software designers. The content is
protected!
Examples:
1.
An insurance company wants to e-mail you details of a quote for insurance.
They don't know if you have MS WORD, or any other word processing program,
so they send it as a pdf file.
2.
A finance company need you to sign some papers and post or fax them
back. They could e-mail you the contract, you print it out, sign it and
post it back saving you two days. Why not Fax it first? Having a file means
you've always got a copy to refer too, and it is of good quality.
3.
A business wants to send you a catalogue, or a price list, they
don't want you changing anything, so sending you a pdf file is a sure
way that the details are correct, and that you can open it to view and
print it out.
4.
An accountant wants to send you a spreadsheet, doesn't know if
you have MS Works or Excel, so sending it as a pdf means you can view it.
5.
You have created something in MS Publisher but none of your
friends have it. Send it as a pdf and they can view it and print it
out.
6.
You are the secretary of a club and you have an important notice or
poster to send out to all of your 30 members, you can't know what programs
they have. You could just send an e-mail but you want it fancier than that.
Send it as a pdf and everyone could open it and print it off.
How does one get Adobe Reader?
Adobe
Reader comes free with most new Computers since at least 2000, is a free
download from the Internet, and it is free from cd-roms that accompany
many computer magazines. (Netguide - NZ)
It
is almost expected that you have it, an international translator if you
will, a standard that is universal regardless of what other programs you
have.
The
golden rule is "You can only open a file if you have the program it
was created in".
If
you see these symbols in your menus you may have it already.
 ,
or
 .
The
latest version is 7, however for Windows 95, and 98 1st edition, they
recommend version 4 - 5.05. and the Internet can work that out for you.
Click below if you want to download it. (allow for an hour - maybe 8
-15mbs)
http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/readstep2.html
How does one create a pdf file?
Download
the free PrimoPDF
program.
After
it is installed, go to print a document by selecting print in the File
menu, where the printers are listed select PrimoPDF, and follow the prompt
for naming the new file and deciding a destination for it.
Hint
If
you open the new pdf file in Adobe Reader, you can simply click the email
icon on the toolbar to attach it to an email for despatching.
The Test!
Click
this file to open a pdf
test file, if you can’t, then you’ll need Acrobat Reader.
Other Attachments that cannot be opened.
One rule of thumb is, that each type of file can only be opened by
the program that created it.
.pps,
= MS PowerPoint (presentation - slideshow) – Acquire PowerPoint Viewer
.xls,
= MS Excel (spreadsheet) – Acquire Excel Viewer
.pub,
= MS Publisher (leaflet, certificate) – No viewer available
.pdf,
= Adobe Reader (Read only document) – Acquire Adobe Reader
.doc,
= MS Word (document) – Acquire Word Viewer
.wps, =
MS Works (document) – Acquire Word Viewer
.wpd,
= Word Perfect (document) – Acquire Word Viewer
....
to name just a few.
More
and more now, we receive attachments sent from people who presume you have
the same programs as them, - wrong, but what can we do?
Rather
than spend money to buy the program just so we can read their emails, in
most cases there are free downloads (add-ons) that will allow us to at
least read the attachment, we just won't be able to add to it.
You can download individual viewers for MS
programs from here http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/results.aspx?displaylang=en&freeText=viewer
N.B.
There is no viewer available for MS Publisher. The only way around it is to
get the sender to make it into a pdf file so you can read it with Adobe
Reader.
You can also Print anything displayed in Adobe Reader.
Another rule of thumb.
New
opens old, but old may not open new.
Another
reason for having Adobe Reader, is that even if you have for example MS
Publisher 97, if you receive a file created with Publisher 2003, you may
not be able to read it. This can be because the new version knows tricks
that the older version does not understand. So once again making it into a
pdf will solve that problem.
I
have even created a cd cover in a publishing program that no else uses,
made it into a pdf and emailed to a friend who could then print it off in
Adobe Reader.
So
that's it!
It's
handy to have, safe surfing,
Bryan Fletcher.
©GUS
September 2005.
www.photographictributes.com
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