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What is a PDF?

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PDF stands for Portable Document Format. Saving a document in this format ensures that it will look the same when viewed on another computer as it did on the original computer when created. It will also have a MUCH smaller file size, hence the “portable” part of the name. PDF is used for representing two-dimensional documents in a device-independent and display resolution-independent fixed-layout document format. Each PDF file encapsulates a complete description of a 2-D document (and, with Acrobat 3-D, embedded 3-D documents) that includes the text, fonts, images, and 2-D vector graphics that compose the document.

If you want to view a .pdf file, you’ll need the free Adobe Acrobat Reader, or even the Foxit Reader. Of course, the free versions of both of these programs will only allow you to read the document, not edit or create a .pdf of your own. For that, you will need full paid versions. Also, for a Mac user, there is a .pdf viewer built right in, so you don’t have to download anything at all!

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Movies that Don’t tell the Tech Truth  - Nov 8, 2007  - chris@pirillo.com (Chris Pirillo) How to Track Things on Google  - Nov 8, 2007  - chris@pirillo.com (Chris Pirillo)What is a PDF? - Nov 8, 2007  - chris@pirillo.com (Chris Pirillo)

What YES this is the first post hahahaha

What YES this is the first post hahahaha

he said “pdf” eight times in this….i dont know why im pointing this out

he said “pdf” eight times in this….i dont know why im pointing this out

PDF-XChange Viewer ( http://www.docu-track.com/home/prod_user/pdfx_viewer/ ) is the best free PDF viewer ever. Not only it allows you to view PDf files, but you can also use it to type over text, fill in forms, etc. Highly recommended.

A few corrections about PDFs, Chris:

1) “Portable” doesn’t refer to file size, but to the fact that the file can be viewed by anyone without needing the app that created it (i.e., view a file created by MS Word without actually owning Word). It’s “portable” because you can send it to anyone.

2) PDF file size is dependent on a number of factors; there are many instances in which PDF file size will be larger than the original format. For instance, if you take a low-quality JPG and save it as a high-quality PDF, the file size will increase. Or if you take a Word file (which doesn’t include fonts) and convert it to a PDF-with-fonts, the file size will be larger.

3) PDFs don’t necessarily include fonts. High-end apps give you the option to include or exclude fonts in PDFs. Especially with large archives of smallish files, excluding fonts can save a lot of disk space.

4) PDFs have the capability to contain vector (resolution-independent) graphics, but because (as you noted) they also have the capability to contain raster (pixel) images, it is not accurate to say that PDFs are by nature resolution-independent.

5) Mac users can create PDFs from any document in any application, including browsers. Choose “Print” from the “File” menu, then click on the “PDF” button in the lower-left, and choose “Save as PDF…”. Slick, eh?

For casual PDF writing, there are a number of free PDF virtual printers available on the internet.

Virtual printers are great – no standalone program to handle. Just print *anything* – select the PDF virtual printer in the printer list, and hey presto – a PDF.

This freeware is easily found via a web seach :)

i use foxit on one of my desktops but i prefere the portable andtiny pdf reader called sumatrapdf (also free)

i use foxit on one of my desktops but i prefere the portable andtiny pdf reader called sumatrapdf (also free)

and its only about 1MB
just google it :P

I thought at one time Open Office had it’s own PDF producer.

Good piece. BTW, you don’t need “full paid versions” (which cost hundreds of dollars) to create a PDF.

Macintosh users can create PDFs with the Pages program, part of Apple’s iWork suite ($79). PC users may use ABBYY PDF Transformer ($100) as well as other PDF-creation tools.

See more about PDFs on the Ourmedia Learning Center:

http://ourmedia.org/node/328718

use foxit reader its better and its free and i cant stress that it’s FASTER and less bloated

use foxit reader its better and its free and i cant stress that it’s FASTER and less bloated

By far this is the best news letter I have subscribed to! I find myself sitting at the computer for along time just to get all the information in one newsletter! I save all of them so I can backtrack at a later date. This letter is better than reading all the computer books I have because you can get to what you want right away. Just wanted to let you know what a great job you are doing.

remember when i discovered that PDF reader was built into OS X

so awesome, even my iPod Touch reads them :D

remember when i discovered that PDF reader was built into OS X

so awesome, even my iPod Touch reads them :D

Ok that was a terrible definition of PDF. PDFs are NOT similar to Word documents. People write stuff in other programs, then CONVERT the final result to PDF because PDF is a format designed to precisely lay out text and visual elements in a precise way so that it can always reproduce the original document exactly.

And dude, PDFs are not small files, in fact it’s a fairly large, ‘coded’ in human readable text with historically weak image compression algorithms.

Ok that was a terrible definition of PDF. PDFs are NOT similar to Word documents. People write stuff in other programs, then CONVERT the final result to PDF because PDF is a format designed to precisely lay out text and visual elements in a precise way so that it can always reproduce the original document exactly.

And dude, PDFs are not small files, in fact it’s a fairly large, ‘coded’ in human readable text with historically weak image compression algorithms.

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