How to Edit .pdf documents?

[abrogard]

I admit I have no knowledge and little interest in all things Adobe.

But I have bought pagemaker, photoshop, premier, golive, acrobat, illustrator and probably more there somewhere.

Why? Looking for how the hell to work with these .pdf files that keep turning up in my inbox.

Often they are forms that just need me to enter stuff in the fields - I have to download, print, write on, scan in, upload all of those.

Sometimes they are docs I want to use and modify myself (perhaps only save a part of). that's even worse, I have to put them through something like Corel and then into Word and massage for yonks to get something reasonable.

All the Adobe stuff I have - to my utter astonishment - seems incapable of helping me. Most of the programmes won't even upload a .pdf document, for god's sake.

Adobe help at their site just runs you around in circles.

I hate 'em. And their .pdf format. But I'm stuck with it.

Please help - what is the easiest way to work with these files?

regards,
abrogard
jepboro@yahoo.com

 

[BionicJohn]

Hi, abrogard,

> 'the printer' ? You don't mean the machine? You mean the man I send the thing to for printing?

Yes, sorry I didn't make it clear - I mean the print workshop, not the box on the desktop which puts dots on paper.

> How can you call yourself a DTP package without it?

Because PM is primarily page layout software.

PM's BB will not do what you want it to do automatically.

Iechyd da! John
19:37 15/06/2003 BST

 

[abrogard]

Thanks Eggles, yes, it helps a lot. I guess I'll open it up again and take another look.

So, Big John, the reason you can call yourself a DTP package is that you are not a DTP package? Maybe the fault is mine, maybe it is never marketed as a DTP package. But I certainly thought it was. I kinda got the impression - as with all Adobe products - that is was marketed as absolutely the supremely best and full of bells and whistles and can't-do-without it package.

Gotta say something about the 'sophisticated software' ( 'imposition' software, that's interesting, a new use for that word for me ).

Where the software the professional printer uses may well be very sophisticated, considering fonts, kerning and god-knows-what-else, all the minutae and technicalities of page layouts, I can't see that simply reordering a set of pages requires a sophisticated algorithm. I can nearly construct it in my head and let me tell you I'm not very bright.

And I don't think much of the reason 'why it is not a well known feature'. The reason begins with 'if it has...' - how does, why would, Adobe assume that everything you want to create 'has to be sent...'?

What they are doing is making it necessary, that's what they are doing.

In fact brochure printing - i.e. a real brochure not just a sheet with four pages on it meant to be folded - should be a stock standard enabling 'power to the people' up front feature. That's what computing is all about.

Or that's very certainly how I see it.

And lastly, thanks again Eggles, but if PM adds the blank pages just anywhere rather than putting them at the end and the beginning then I think that's probably the shonkiest bit of coding in a package of this type one can think of.

And lastly lastly.. 'serious publishing'? I'm in China. Do you know how serious they are here with cottage industry? Do you realise what an integral and significant part of the economies of these countries (china, india, indonesia, et al...) home computer 'manufacturing' is?

Like making CD's, CD covers, VCD's, books, booklets, brochures, leaflets and things I haven't even though of?

They make computers and modern peripherals such as printers and copiers, scanners, burners, work. They make them work to create a job for themselves. Everything is serious. Everything can potentially bring in a dollar. Nothing is trivial or non serious - or if it is it is quickly discarded.

If you can knock up a quick booklet right there on your pc this is serious. This is business.

Lastly, lastly, lastly I see I forgot to tell you what I'm doing in China. I'm teaching English at the moment, in a place called Chengdu, Sichuan province. Do you know it?

regards,

abrogard.

'The daylight breaks.. a picture show of endless takes...'
Chris Rea

 

[BionicJohn]

Hi, abrogard,

> 'imposition' software, that's interesting, a new use for that word for me ).

Have a look at, for example, Farrukh Systems Imposition Software: Imposition Publisher at

http://www.farrukh.co.uk/.

Others are listed at:

http://www.digitalout.com/buyersguide/2002/category/software/imposition.html

> I can nearly construct it in my head and let me tell you I'm not very bright.

You may be able to visualise 8 A5 pages duplexed on a sheet of A3 and how they should be oriented, ordered, guillotined and bound, but for a book, 500 page monthly magazine or a Sunday broadsheet it is another matter.

Iechyd da! John
00:12 16/06/2003 BST

 

[Eggles]

abrogard

I still detect some animosity in all this subsequent discussion, but I think where some of the problems arise is that whereas you are concerned with 'in-house' printing i.e. printing to your own desktop printer (or it may be a little big for a desktop, but you get the idea), many people using PM on this forum are sending it out for commercial printing (usually offset). So once that has been dealt with, your concerns obviously are going to be a bit different.

PM is perfectly capable of doing everything necessary for printing in-house, and if that includes imposition, then it can. You can't do that with Quark (the 'industry standard' layout software in much of the western world) without yet another expensive 3rd party plug-in. I personally have printed in the last six months (on a Xerox Phaser 7700 colour laser) two 40 page booklets of A5 page 'readers spreads' on to A4 paper i.e. as side-by-side 'printers spreads' from PM. I don't think just because PM cannot make the decision (obvious perhaps to humans) where to insert blank pages if your document doesn't have a total number of pages a multiple of 4, to be a deficiency. What do you think it should do if you have 29 pages? (or any other number that requires 3 blank pages to be inserted?) Where do you think PM should be able to decide to put them? I have never done a book/booklet layout where I didn't have a multiple of 4 pages, since I know that is the proper way to do it - even if that includes one or more blank pages. So I could be talking through my hat by stating that PM inserts those blanks at the end - I have never asked it to do so, so I am guessing this is what it would do.

Re:What they are doing is making it necessary, that's what they are doing. In fact brochure printing - i.e. a real brochure not just a sheet with four pages on it meant to be folded - should be a stock standard enabling 'power to the people' up front feature. That's what computing is all about.

Yes - but this certainly depends on the quality of the printer hardware the 'people' have access to. Not too many workplaces where DTP is a very small component have printers capable of (a) using anything larger than A4 paper and (b) colour laser printers. So being able to do impositions (and if necessary guillotining if you do more than 2-up) and even the binding (even as simple as having a long-arm stapler) is not something usually considered as possible. Which I guess is why any job that is complex enough to require imposition, guillotining and binding is outsourced. But if you have access to the printer hardware and the guillotine and long-arm stapler (if the publication isn't too big - otherwise that raises quite another set of issues of how to bind - and you also have to start considering 'creep' etc) then PM will do all the necessary layout and imposition for you.

I think I have lost track of what this post started out trying to say, so I'll stop now.

Where are you from originally?

 

[abrogard]

Hi Eggles...

the thread started with how to edit .pdf and it has mutated into how to use pagemaker - which is fine by me but probably not really kosher for the moderator if there is one. We'll soon be finished I guess.

Your antenna are pretty sensitive if you detect animosity. I don't think there is any. Maybe just a tad - directed towards Adobe, from me. I really don't like them and their products... got no satisfaction from them yet..

BigJohn says I may be able to visualise... etc, etc., but I only said:

"....reordering a set of pages requires a sophisticated algorithm. I can nearly construct it in my head and let..."

I'm not talking about visualising anything. It's a trivial exercise. The algorithm should be expandable to n pages, no problem.

Eggles it's good to see you've actually done yourself what I'm talking about. I'll get into the package again and find that bit. I'm interested that Quark the 'industry standard' doesn't do it - that's the kind of thing I'm talking about.. the kind of lack I was thinking I'd found right here in this function in Adobe. So you know what I mean. It is not unusual, not at all. In fact it is the norm.

Windows itself, after all its incarnations doesn't have the functionality of the VAX DCL (digital command language) and what it could do to text files.

And long arm staplers etc.? It's a question, to my mind, of cart before the horse. Given access to this technology people will have no trouble going out and getting the stapler. It's a bit daft for software retailers to say they won't supply something (or they'll hide it away) because no one has a long arm stapler, isn't it?

But that sort of thinking is not unusual, either. Biggest classic case in the world: IBM. 'The world demand for computers will be about 8" or some such famous apocryphal remark which denied the possibility, feasibility of the whole pc world.

And, incidentally, losing a billion dollar market.

I'd been thinking of binding with a needle and thread actually. Something you see frequently in India in homemade publications and, incidentally, how many of our own books are bound. Section by section, isn't it? Sewn. Then stuck at the back to a piece of linen which holds the covers.

I think this is what they call the Excelsior or somesuch binding method - the word, whatever it is, meaning 'the best'.

And it is good and perfectly adaptable to home use.

My project was/is (it must be resurrected now) quite simple as I said:

" I wanted it to format into tiny print and so's I could print the book out two pages to a sheet. Got it?

And then I would print on the backs of those pages in the same way.

And then I would put all these double pages together - one on top of the other - and then I'd have a section of the book. And it would read page 1 - half of back of the first sheet - page two half of front of first sheet. Page three half of back of second... get the idea? "

Can't get much simpler than that, can you? No colour. No pictures. All A4. In fact I'd like to make is smaller - pocket size. All A5 maybe.

Oh.. .the blanks... I think it is obvious. 1 is at the front as a flyleaf for my preference but the point is it should be front or back, not in the body. 2 is one at the front (flyleaf) and one at the back (notes). 3is one at the front and two at the back.

Whew....

I am from Australia.

The lucky country. Keep it a secret.

 

[papajoe]

Dear Abrogard...
I recently used Acrobat [Writer] 5.0 to convert our local Masonic Lodge's Public School Speech Contest into 14 separate *.pdf pages and upload via the internet to over 400 Lodges in CA and adjoining States. I made two separate packets when uploading and was surprised to find that the overall bits were compressed to less than 2MB per packet.

Those users on the other end only have to print out each document as a guideline to the program I developed. By using Acrobat [full writing version] they can enter their own names and dates as needed. However, if they want to change much of the data or format, I suggested that they covert it back into PM 7.01 format first.

I understand your frustration at some of these [so-called]
"user friendly" programs, but don't give up the ship. I've also purchased several programs that have taken far more time and effort to learn than I was originally led to believe at time of purchase. But this [Adobe] forum has been a blessing to me over the years. Most folks are sincere with their advice and usually provide meaningful solutions to my problems. Even though some of these "answers" may be in the book...simple explanations from those who have solved various problems sure makes it a lot easier on the 'ol dura mater.

Papa Joe/Perris CA

 

[tperkins]

Abrogard, This thread has gotten long hasn't it? I don't know if it was mentioned in all the replies but I use "PitStop Professional" to edit and manipulate pdf files. You can download a trial version at

http://www.enfocus.com

We are a printer and service bureau here and it has helped tremendously on all the pdf files we have coming in. Give it a try and hope it is what you are looking for.

Tony Perkins

 

[viol8ion]

>>Sometimes they are docs I want to use and modify myself (perhaps only save a part of). that's even worse, I have to put them through something like Corel and then into Word and massage for yonks to get something reasonable.<<

It seems Eggles covered most of your issues with the best solutions, but for editing a part of a PDF I have a workaround that I often use.

Open the PDF in either Illustrator which gives you limited ability to edit text, move graphics, etc. and preserves the vector elements ; or open with Photoshop which converts the PDF into a raster image, which is not so good if it is texxt heavy.

When in doubt, deny all terms and defnitions.

http://www.wuli.com