I've been using Foxit PDF instead of Adobe Reader for ages. I'm not a big user of PDF files, so I don't need whatever it is Adobe jams in to the 90-some-odd megs of disk space the new version consumes. Vuzit's online document viewer is a nice service, but I want single-click document handling. I don't want to download a file, open a new tab, browse to Vuzit, then browse to and upload my doc.
The Nodobe addon does exactly what I want, adding a new option Firefox's right-click menu. Find a file you need to open, right click it, and Vuzit's online viewer will display it in a new tab.
My one complaint is that it doesn't add an option to the download dialog, meaning it can't handle attachments from my Gmail. OpenItOnline, my document handler of choice, does provide that functionality.
Those with privacy concerns will want to read Vuzit's policy first, just to be on the safe side. I like to err on the side of caution with my docs, so anything really important I'll still be reading offline. For manuals, spec sheets, and the like, the Nodobe Viewer is a great alternative.
When people think about the most irritating apps on their computer, Adobe Reader usually shows up on the list. Our readers tend to think the alternatives (like Foxit) are the way to go, and I couldn't agree more.
That's why I decided to give PDFMeNot's web app a try. I'm a Foxit user, but I really don't use PDF files that often. If PDFMeNot works well, that's one more app I can leave off my flash drive. Also, I enjoy the irony of thinking that I'm getting away from Adobe, when really I'm just choosing Flash over Reader.
Damn it. You win again, Adobe.
I did a quick Google search and located an unclassified Air Force finance report, and dropped in the URL. It took a little bit (about three minutes or so, but it was a 728-page report) for the document to be displayed, but once it was up it worked nicely.
The developers are nice enough to offer a tools page, where you'll find a bookmarklet, Firefox extension, and even code to embed the viewer on your own page.
Since it only functions as a viewer and I can't print from it, I'll be sticking with Foxit portable. I will, however, keep PDFMeNot filed away for days when I forget my flash drive somewhere.
PDF Image Extract is a free Windows utility that does exactly what the name suggests: it extracts images from PDF files. Sure, you could save pictures one at a time the old fashioned way by hitting print screen and pasting the image into an editor or using a screen capture program. But PDF Image Extract saves you a lot of time if you want to save multiple images because it will save every single image in a PDF file for you. In fact, you can create batch jobs to save images from multiple documents.
The only down side? I'm not kidding when I say PDF Image Extract saves every image. You'll likely wind up with a folder containing hundreds of images, only a few of which are the ones you were looking for. That's because the program will save all sorts of segments of the original PDF as image files, including the background.
We're willing to bet radiologists in Shanghai like to listen to music -- who doesn't? -- but that's not how they're using iTunes. At Renji Hospital and Shanghai Jiaotong University School of Medicine, they're using it to organize PDFs of important medical research and images that they say are more useful than many textbooks.
You can drop a PDF into iTunes and sort it just like you would with music. That means that the medical documents in Shanghai are searchable, ratable, and can be given multiple different tags. Before iTunes, they were keeping redundant copies of PDFs in directories by category. Now, they only need to keep one of each. So, if you've been looking for software that can organize your PDFs, think about an app you likely already have: iTunes!
If the thought of downloading a large PDF file makes you (or your computer) shiver, check out PDF Download 2.0. This free Firefox extension gives you several options upon encountering a PDF file. First, you are presented with a warning that you have encountered a PDF file. Then you are given the choice to download it, view it as HTML, skip it or bypass using PDF Download.
Last year we looked at version 1.0. But since then, PDF Download has added at least one major new feature. Not only can you convert PDF to HTML for easier viewing and choose how and when to view your PDFs, you can now also convert a web page to a PDF document, keeping the general look and layout of the page.
PDF Download is useful because whenever you click on a PDF link, instead of just opening the link, you are given a choice on how to proceed. And some of those chices just might save you some time.
We'd normally write something mildly clever in this spot, but to be honest, it's been a long week and we're just too tired to be clever. So umm, a man walks into a bar. He says ouch. See what we mean? Anyway, have some of our favorite posts from the last week:
Help! Windows cannot open this file Ever download a shiny new file from the internet only to realize you have no idea how to open it, make it run, or do whatever it is it's supposed to do? We've compiled a roundup of some of the best Windows applications for opening pretty much any file type. Make sure to check out the comments, because it turns out y'all provided a veritable treasure trove of additional suggestions.
aTunes: Cross-platform open source media player Looking for a media player capable of handling pretty much anything you can throw at it (except DRM)? aTunes might just fit the bill. And it's open soruce and cross-platform to boot. There's a native Windows version, but since the application is Java based, you can also run it on OS X and Unix/Linux. Oh, and did we mention it displays lyrics and has a karaoke mode?
PlanningWiz: Plan and share room layouts Whether you're moving into a new place or trying to figure out how to better utilize the space you have, odds are PlanningWiz can save you an awful lot of time and graphing paper. This web-based app makes it easy to set your room dimensions and then start figuring out where to put the couch, table, entertainment system and missile silo.
Tofu makes on-screen reading actually bearable Computer monitors are a lot better than they used to be, but let's face it, even though we spend all day staring at a computer screen we have a hard time reading large amounts of text on a computer screen. That pretty much rules out reading eBooks. But Tofu is a desktop app for Mac that takes large chunks of text and breaks them up into shorter, more easily digestable segments so you can tackle War and Peace without all the eye strain.
Inline PDF viewing for Firefox 3? There's a plugin for that While the Safari web browser features support for inline PDF viewing, if you happen across a PDF online while using the Mac version of Firefox 3, you have two choices: download the PDF or install this plugin. Nuff said.
Sync your Google Reader, NewsGator feeds with RSS Bandit There's a new alpha version of RSS Bandit, a desktop RSS reader for Windows that adds one killer new feature: Support for synchronization with online feed readers like Google Reader and NewsGator. In other words, you can configure RSS Bandit to not only import your feed list, but to mark items as read in your online reader once you've read them using the desktop reader, or vice versa.
Pdf search engine bills itself as a search engine to locate ebooks on the Internet. Enter in the title you are looking for and it scour the world wide web displaying links to pdf files it comes across that matches your search term.
But you'd be wrong if you thought pdf search engine was just a one trick pony. While it does call itself a book search engine, the site can also locate any pdf document that's out there. In our testing, we were able to locate tax return forms, DMV applications for specific states and other pdf documents floating around the 'net.
Powered by google, pdf search engine might be the site to visit when you're looking for pdf documents on the Internet. Or you could simply just enter what you're looking for plus filetype:pdf in google and achieve the same results.
If you're like us, you have to read long blocks of text on a monitor all the time, and it's kind of a pain for your eyes. E-books and long PDF articles would be great if they could somehow get diced into neat, readable columns. Hey, it works for newspapers. Well, Tofu brings that pleasant reading experience to the Mac.
In a nutshell, Tofu cuts up what you're reading -- whether it's a PDF, a doc, or a chunk of text you've selected -- into columns. This is a good, because monitors are wider than the human eye is really comfortable with, and columns fit the text into your optimal scanning area for easy reading. Tofu's full screen mode and adjustable text size and colors are crucial, too. This app is good enough that we'll think twice before printing out something we can just read in Tofu.
If you've recently switched to Firefox for Mac, you're probably getting used to hearing all your problems answered with "there's a plugin for that." Well, here's one more problem plugins can solve: inline PDF viewing. Safari does it automatically, and you might be missing it if you've switched recently.
You could always download the PDFs and open them with the notoriously slow Acrobat Reader or a faster 3rd-party app, but if you want them to open right in your browser, just grab this plugin. No frills here, the description on Google Code simply says it, "uses PDFKit to display PDFs in the browser." We tested it out on some huge PDF magazines, and it handles them just as well as Safari can.
Microsoft has announced plans to add support for a several new document formats to Office 2007. The company plans to release Office 2007 SP2 during the first half of 2009, and it will add support for XPS, PDF 1.5, and ODF 1.1 files, among others.
Users will be able to create, open, and edit ODF documents, and save documents as XPS, PDF, or ODF files. The Open Document Format, or ODF is an open source challenger to Microsoft's Office formats. A few years ago the company released an add-on for Microsoft Word that would allow users to open ODF documents. But with the launch of Office 2007 SP2, support for ODF and PDF files will be built right into the applications. No add-ons necessary.
Or you could just use OpenOffice.org today. No waiting until 2009 necessary.
Foxit Reader 2.3 has just been released, and not only is it quicker and lighter on system resources than Adobe Reader, but the latest version adds a ton of useful features like tabbed viewing. For some reason tabs took the web browser world by storm a few years ago, but failed to catch on in other applications. But if you spend a lot of time reading PDF files, we don't have to tell you how much less clutter you have on your desktop when you open your documents in tabs instead of separate program windows.
In addition to tabbed viewing, Foxit 2.3 adds:
Bookmarks
Multimedia playback in PDF files
Text tool for adding comments to documents
Rulers for aligning documents properly
Magnifier for zooming in portions of a document
Automatic scrolling
Improved ability to print just a selected area of a document
For those looking to convert a Word document to a PDF file, there are a largenumber of solutions out there. But how about vice versa? There haven't been many programs brave enough to try and convert a PDF to a Word document.
One program that has stepped up to the plate is PDF to Word Converter 1.1, a free tool that converts a PDF back to a Word document for editing, removing and adding elements, and more.
The program is a small download (about 1 MB), and installation is straightforward. The user interface is straightforward as well: you select the PDF you wish to convert, choose where you want the Word document to be saved, and you're ready to go. Options include the number of pages to convert (you can select all or portions of the document), choice of a default font, and the option to retain shapes and images.
In our test, PDF to Word converter worked flawlessly, quickly and neatly converting a 5 page PDF file in about five seconds.
PDF to Word converter is a nice desktop solution, though it is limited to one conversion type. If you can get online, you might be better served with Zamzar, the online file conversion tool with support for a huge amount of conversion types.
Ever need to fill out the fill-in forms on a PDF document while using a computer without Adobe Reader installed? PDFescape is an online PDF viewer and editor that has almost all the features you could ever need. And that includes the ability to fill in forms, something which you won't find in most other online PDF viewers.
PDFescape works with Firefox 1.5 or newer, Internet Explorer 6 or 7, and Safari.
Aside from filling in forms, you can also use PDFescape to perform basic edits like adding shapes and text to documents. Unregistered users can then export these documents but you're file will have a watermark. Registered users can save documents online and purchase "premium credits" to publish documents without watermarks. You get some free credits just for signing up.
PDF files are great if you want to share a lot of information in an easy to read format. And in theory, visitors to your web site can easily download the files to their desktop or open them in a web browser. But the truth of the matter is that opening PDF files using the Adobe Acrobat plugin for Firefox or Internet Explorer can be a bit of hassle. It often takes a long time to open the file, and their browsers are rendered pretty much useless while they wait.
Enter PdfMeNot. Like Scribd, DocStoc, and Issuu, PdfMeNot instantly converts PDF files into Flash media that can be quickly loaded in any web browser. You can either embed the Flash image on your site or offer readers a download link to the original PDF file. And you can convert files that are already online by entering a URL or upload files from your desktop.
PdfMeNot, which was developed by the folks behind BugMeNot and RetailMeNot, has a few tricks up its sleeve that other services lack. For example, if you want to view any online PDF as a Flash image, just enter http://pdfmenot.com/view/ before the URL. For example, http://pdfmenot.com/view/http://test.com/document.pdf.
The coolest trick comes in the form of a browser bookmarklet. All you have to do is drag this boomarklet to your browser toolbar and any time you visit a site with links to PDF documents, click the bookmarklet. Every PDF link on the page will be converted to a Flash link, saving you the frustration of dealing with PDF documents online.
PdfMenot is in private beta until Thursday. Until then, you can login to the site with the username "stateless" and the password "system."
If the thought of downloading a large PDF file makes you (or your computer) shiver, check out 
We'd normally write something mildly clever in this spot, but to be honest, it's been a long week and we're just too tired to be clever. So umm, a man walks into a bar. He says ouch. See what we mean? Anyway, have some of our favorite posts from the last week:
Pdf search engine
