Computer Beginner Guide

Mac OS X and Adobe PDF are married at the operating system level and you can find several ways to convert your authoring files to the PDF format. The Acrobat-supported method uses the same type of printer driver you find on Windows. From any authoring program, select the Print command (most commonly accessed by choosing File >> Print). When the Print dialog box opens, select Adobe PDF 8.0 from the Printer pull-down menu. From the default selection for Copies and Pages, open the pull-down menu and select PDF Options. The dialog box changes so that you can access Adobe PDF Settings from a pull-down menu. The default selection is Use Default. If you leave this option active, the most recent settings selected in the Distiller application are used to produce the PDF file. The remaining options are the same as those discussed for Windows users. When you add new custom settings, they appear in the Adobe PDF Settings pull-down menus from the Print dialog boxes on Windows

When you install Acrobat Professional or Acrobat Standard, the Adobe PDF printer is installed in your Printers folder. As a printer driver, the file is accessible from any program capable of printing, including your computer accessories and utilities. Like any other printer you install on Windows 2000 with Service Pak 4, Windows XP Professional, Windows XP Home Edition, or Tablet PC with Service Pak 2, you can set the Adobe PDF printer as the default printer. Once set as the default printer, you don’t need to make a printer selection each time you want to create a PDF document. You may also have the Acrobat Distiller printer installed in your Printer’s folder. The features associated with the Adobe PDF printer and the Acrobat Distiller printer are identical. To convert any application document to PDF, choose File >> Print or access the Print dialog box with the menu command in your authoring program. Some dedicated vertical market programs, such as accounting and ot

Index files can be scattered all over your hard drive and, at times, it can be a chore to load them in the Index selection dialog box. In addition, when sharing PDFs where indexes have been created requires you to either attach an index file to a PDF or send along your index to recipients of your PDFs. Again, the steps involved can be aggravating if you have to spend time finding the index files on your hard drive. Acrobat 8 has simplified the steps for loading index files and sharing them. Now in Acrobat 8 you can embed an index file in PDFs. Embedding an index file is limited to a single PDF document and not a collection of PDFs. Therefore, it makes sense to embed an index file in a document having many pages or in PDF Packages. You won’t gain any better performance embedding indexes in one page PDFs or files containing few pages. When you embed an index file you bypass all the steps for creating an index using Acrobat Catalog. Indexes are automatically created and embed

A computer network server, another computer on your network, a CD-ROM, DVD-ROM, external hard drive, and a removable media cartridge are considered external to your local computer hard drive(s). Any of these devices can be indexed and the index file can be located on any of the devices you index. If you want to save an index file on a device different from where the PDF collection is stored, you need to be certain to open the Preferences dialog box for the Catalog preferences and enable the check box for Allow indexing on separate drives. This preference setting enables you to index across media devices. When you want to write index files to read only media such as CD-ROMs and DVDs, you need to create the index file from PDFs stored on your hard drive. After the index file is created, copy the index file, the supporting files, and the PDFs to your media and burn the disc. When you want to search an index, you can activate the index in the Index selection dialog box and in

Catalog preference settings are contained in the Preferences dialog box. Choose Edit >> Preferences and click the Catalog item in the left pane. Notice that the Index Defaults items use the same settings as found in the Options dialog box from the New Index Selection dialog box. The top three options under Indexing in Catalog preferences are obtained only here in these preference settings. The three options found in the Indexing section of the Catalog preferences are as follows: Allow indexing on separate drives . When creating index files where you want to include folders on network servers and/or computers on your network, select this item in the Catalog preferences. The indexing option includes indexing files only on local networks. Unfortunately, you can’t index files on Web servers and use indexes from within Web browsers. Force ISO 9660 compatibility on folders . This setting is a flag that tells Catalog to look for any folders that are not compliant with

After you’ve set all the attributes for the index definition, the index file is ready to be created. Clicking the Build button in the New Index Definition dialog box creates indexes. When you click this button, Acrobat Catalog opens the Save Index File dialog box where you supply a filename and target a destination on your hard drive. The default file extension is .pdx. Do not modify the file extension name. Acrobat recognizes these files when loading search indexes. The location where you instruct Catalog to save your index file can be any location on your hard drive regardless of where the files being indexed reside. You can choose to save the index file inside or outside the folder that Catalog created during the indexing. Therefore you have an index file and a folder containing index resources. The relationship between the index file and resource folder locations is critical to the usability of the index. If you move the index file to a different location without movin

To the right of the Index Description field is a button labeled Options. Click this button and the Options dialog box appears, allowing you to choose from a number of different attributes for your index file. Some of these options are similar to the Preference settings for Acrobat Catalog you made in the Preferences dialog box. Any edits you make here supersede Preference settings. Do Not Include Numbers The first item in the Options dialog box is a check box for excluding numbers. By selecting the Do not include numbers option, you can reduce the file size, especially if data containing many numbers are part of the PDF file(s) to be indexed. Keep in mind, however, that if numbers are excluded, Search won’t find numeric values. Add IDs to Adobe v1.0 files Because Acrobat is now in version 8.0, finding old PDF 1.0 files that need to be updated with IDs may rarely happen. If you do have legacy files saved as PDF 1.0 format, it would be best to batch process the older PDFs b

What has been covered so far is information about finding content in PDF documents with a very elaborate find feature in Acrobat. The name used in Acrobat to refer to what has been discussed so far is “Search.” Users of earlier versions of Acrobat may take this to mean using Acrobat Search as it was used in Acrobat viewers earlier than version 6.0. What has been covered thus far, however, is a Search of data files that was greatly improved in Acrobat version 6 and is more powerful in returning results in Acrobat version 8. To understand the difference between the preceding pages and what follows requires a little explanation. In addition to full-text searches for documents, you can also create a separate index file and search one or more indexes at a time. Index files provide some benefit in that they are still a little faster than full-text searches, can be automatically assigned to PDF documents in the Advanced tab in the Document Properties, and can be automatically loa

Document descriptions are user-supplied data fields used to help you identify PDF files according to title, subject, author, and keywords. At the time you create a PDF document, you may have options for supplying a document description. In other cases, you may add descriptions in Acrobat either individually or with Acrobat’s batch processing features. After you add descriptions and save your files, the data added to these fields are searchable via advanced searches and index file searches. Developing an organized workflow with specific guidelines for users to follow regarding document descriptions significantly helps all your colleagues search PDFs much more efficiently. To add a document description, choose File >> Document Properties. When the Document Properties dialog box opens, click the Description tab. The four fields for document descriptions are as follows: Title . The Title field in this example contains a description of a form. Other forms in a company

The Return results containing pull-down menu in the Search PDF window contains a Boolean query menu option for searching with Boolean expressions. Boolean expressions include AND, OR, and NOT. Acrobat recognizes these Boolean operators when you invoke a search. You can use all the previously listed criteria when you want to use the Boolean expressions option. To search with Boolean expressions you need to search an index file. Boolean operators are not recognized when searching the current open document or when browsing folders. AND operator . Use AND between two words to find documents that contain both terms, in any order. For example, type Paris AND France to identify documents that contain both Paris and France. Searches with AND and no other Boolean operators produce the same results as selecting the All Of The Words option. OR operator . Use to search for all instances of either term. For example, type email OR e-mail to find all documents with occurrences of

The ability to search a document’s metadata is a powerful tool in Acrobat. In order to use the tool, you need to know just a little bit about what metadata is. Adobe Acrobat 5.0 and later contains metadata in XML (eXtensible Markup Language) format. In Acrobat 7 and 8 object metadata are accessible. The metadata of a file or an image is information related to the document structure, origination, content, interchange, and processing. Metadata might include, for example, the document author’s name, the creation date, modified date, the PDF producer, copyright information on images, color space on images, and more. When you click Search, the search results report all files where the searched words are contained in a document’s metadata. XMP (eXtensible Metadata Platform) is an XML framework that provides all Adobe programs a common language for communicating standards related to document creation and processing throughout publishing workflows. XMP is a format, and document m

To help you target the precise date with the field box and the calendar, Acrobat offers you several options. To change the year, you can edit the field box and type the year for the date to be searched. In the field box you can change dates by clicking the day, month, and year, and then use the up or down arrow keys to scroll dates. The dates revolve like an odometer. Select a day, and then click the month to highlight the value and press the arrow keys again until you find the correct month. Move to the year and follow the same steps to select the correct year. You can also select any one of the three values and type new values you want to search when the text is selected. The text you type replaces all selected text. Acrobat accepts only a legitimate value, so if you type a value not permitted for a date search, for example, entering 33 in the day field, Acrobat will not accept it. To change dates with the calendar, click the down arrow in the pull-down menu adjacent to

You perform searches by accessing a menu command, clicking the Search tool, or by using shortcut keys. To search from the menu, choose Edit >> Search, or open a context menu with the Hand tool, and select Search. Click the Search tool in the File toolbar and the Search window opens. To use the keyboard shortcut, press Ctrl+Shift+F and likewise the Search window opens. These all allow you to search for a word in an open document, in a collection of PDF files stored on your hard drive, or any type of external media. When you invoke a search, the Search window opens as a floating window. The window can be sized by dragging the lower-right corner out or in to size the width and height. When the Search window is in view, you type a word or words to be searched for in the field box that appears at the top of the window. You are limited to the actual word(s) you want to find when you perform a simple search. You cannot use Boolean (AND, OR, and NOT) operators or any kind

In order to use the Find toolbar, you must have a document open in the Document pane. If you have more than one document open, you can search only the active document appearing in the foreground. Finding words in an open document can be handled in the Find toolbar. If the toolbar is not loaded in the Toolbar Well, select Edit >> Find or press Ctrl+F. The toolbar then opens as a floating toolbar. Type a word in the field box in the Find toolbar and press the Enter/Return key. Acrobat searches the current active document and highlights the first occurrence of the found word. When a word is found, the Previous and Next buttons in the toolbar become active. Click the Next button in the toolbar, and Acrobat searches for the next occurrence and stops on the page where the word is highlighted again. Clicking Previous takes you to the last found word in the open document (if you click the button after the first search). When you click Next, and then click the Previous butto

The Organizer is a tool similar in some respects to Adobe Bridge. Although not all features within Adobe Bridge are available in Acrobat’s Organizer, it has many impressive tools and commands that help you manage and access documents from within Acrobat. To open the Organizer, choose File >> Organizer >> Open Organizer, click the Organizer tool in the File toolbar, or press Shift+Ctrl+1. (On Windows you can also choose File >> History >> Open Organizer.) When you select any of the options, the Organizer, opens. The Organizer window contains three panes, a number of tools, and menu commands that you select from context menus. When you first open the Organizer, you find three panes in the Organizer window divided by two separator bars. On the left side of the window is the Categories pane. In the center, you find the Files pane and the right side holds the Pages pane. You can adjust the size of the panes by clicking a separator bar and dragging it to

The Files pane contains a list of all files derived from the choice you made in the Categories pane. For example, click a History category, and all files viewed within the selected history timeframe appear in a list sorted by metadata that you select from the Sort by pull-down menu. In addition to the file list you have tools at the top of the pane and context menu commands when opening a context menu on a file in the list. Beginning with the tools at the top of the pane, you find the following: Open . By default, the first file in the pane is selected. Click the Open tool to open the selected file. If no file is selected in the pane, the Open tool, as well as all other tools, are grayed out. A condition where you might not have a file selected is when you click a collection that contains no file in the collection folder or when viewing a folder that contains no PDF documents. Otherwise, the first file, by default, is always selected when files are shown in the li

Initial View is the page view you see when you first open a PDF document. You can set several different attributes for an opening view and you can save your settings with the document. These views are document specific so they only relate to a document where you save the settings. When no settings have been saved with a file, the file is saved with a default view. Coincidentally, even though previous versions of Acrobat provided you with options to save an initial view, most PDF authors rarely use them. You can find thousands of PDF files on the Internet and most of them have no settings enabled for an opening view other than the program defaults. To set the attributes for the opening view, choose File >> Properties or use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+D. The Document Properties dialog box opens, displaying a row of tabs at the top. Click the Initial View tab as shown in Figure below. Initial View settings are not available nor can they be changed in Adobe Reader e

The Page Display view can be any one of four different layout types. Choices for page layout are contained in the View >> Page Display submenu and also the Page Display toolbar. Depending on the way a PDF file has been saved and depending on what preference choices are made for the Initial View, a PDF layout may appear different on different computers according to each individual user’s preference settings. Regardless of how you set your preferences, you can change the Page Display view at any time. Single Page . This layout places an entire page in view when the zoom level is set to Fit Page. When you press the Page Down key or the down-arrow key to scroll pages, the next page snaps into view. Single Page Continuous . Formerly labeled Continuous in earlier Acrobat viewers. This page layout view show pages in a linear fashion, where you might see the bottom of one page and the top of another page in the Document pane as you scroll down. The difference betwee

When you open a PDF document you can choose to view the file in one of two modes where the Acrobat menu remains visible. The two views include the default editing mode and Reading mode. Another mode available to you is Full Screen mode; however, in this mode the menu bar is hidden. The new Reading mode command changes the view of PDF files in the Acrobat window. To switch to Reading mode, select View >> Reading mode. The screen view immediately changes to a different view. All toolbars are temporarily hidden and the Navigation panel likewise disappears. If you have floating toolbars open the toolbars are hidden when you enter Reading mode. Floating Navigation panels they remain in view when in Reading mode. Reading mode provides you with more space dedicated to your document without the interference of the Toolbar Well and Navigation panel. This mode makes it especially easier to devote your attention to reading document pages on laptop and tablet computers. To und

The View menu contains all the page navigation commands contained in the Navigation toolbar. Notice that the View menu clearly describes viewing operations, and new users should be easily able to find menu commands associated with views. In as much as the View menu enables you to select menu commands that perform the same operations as those performed with the Navigation toolbar, you might opt for using the toolbar or keyboard shortcuts to navigate pages because other methods for page navigation are much easier than returning to menu commands. The real value in the View menu is all the other viewing commands you have accessible. The View menu contains many commands for viewing not only pages, but also toolbars and task buttons. When you choose View >> Go To, the page navigation commands appear in a submenu. Those viewing commands, apart from the same options you have for navigation with the Navigation toolbar, include commands for viewing tools, for various

This command is a marvelous accessibility tool in all Acrobat viewers. You can have Acrobat PDF documents read aloud to you without having to purchase additional equipment/software such as screen readers. If you want to turn your back on the computer while doing some other activity, you can have Acrobat read aloud any open document. When you choose View >> Read Out Loud, a submenu opens with four menu commands. The menu commands all have keyboard shortcuts associated with them, but before you can use the commands you must first select Activate Read Out Loud in the submenu. The menu commands then become active as you see in Figure below. For pausing and stopping the reading, you may want to remember these keyboard shortcuts. The commands include: Reading Order . Three choices are available from the Reading Order pull-down menu. When in doubt, use the default setting to Infer reading order from document (recommended). Infer reading order from document (recommen