TE RI AL Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat MA T TE What Is Adobe Acrobat? D o start off this large book on Adobe Acrobat, let’s first take a look at what Acrobat is and what PDF is, and let’s try to get a grasp on some of the many options you have for working with PDF files in Acrobat. CO PY RI GH Assuming you know little about Adobe Acrobat, I start with a brief description of what Acrobat is and what it is not.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat throughout the book, I’m referring to Acrobat Professional for both Windows and Macintosh and Acrobat Standard for Windows users only. Where the two programs differ in features, I point them out. I also mention when a feature is only available in Acrobat Professional. There are distinctions between the Acrobat Standard product (Windows) and the Acrobat Professional product in terms of tools and commands.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat So what’s special about PDF and its multiplatform compliance? It’s not so much an issue of viewing a page on one computer created from another computer that is impressive about PDF. After all, such popular programs as Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Word, Adobe Photoshop, Adobe InDesign, Adobe FrameMaker, and Adobe Illustrator all have counterparts for multiplatform usage.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat Acrobat Professional has added more tools for helping users repurpose documents. Tools for repairing problem files, downsizing file sizes, porting files to a range of different devices, and eliminating unnecessary data are part of the many features found in Acrobat Professional. In addition, the new PDF/A format available in Acrobat 8 is designed specifically for archiving documents.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat Each PDF version provides support for additional features. It’s not as important to know all the features enabled by one version as it is to know which PDF version you need to use. For example, to optimize a PDF file for printing, you may need to use PDF version 1.3 (Acrobat 4–compatible). Or, if you want to embed movie files in a PDF, then you need to use an Acrobat 6–compatible file (PDF version 1.5).
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat of which you may like and others you may not. I’ll explain more about the user interface in later chapters where I discuss tools and viewing PDF documents. For now, let me share the reasons why Adobe has made the current significant changes to Acrobat 8. Adobe Systems is a company committed to user feedback and responding to user needs. Most often, we find changes being made in Acrobat, and all of Adobe’s products, as the result of a demand by a significant number of users.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat n Color Scheme. The Acrobat window has changed color because many users want to have more emphasis on the document page and less on the Acrobat workspace. The contrast in color between the background Document pane color emphasizes document pages more when the pages are white. White is the most common page color used by most users. n Elimination of the Status Bar. You’ll notice immediately that the familiar Status bar in Acrobat 8 is now absent.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat B Menu bar. The menu bar contains all the top-level menu commands. These menu choices are also available from various actions associated with links and form fields when you choose the Execute a menu item command in the Actions Properties dialog box for links, form fields, and other features that permit associating an action with a command. When viewing files showing toolbars and menus for each open document, the Acrobat window appears as shown in Figure 1.2.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat C Toolbars. A number of individual toolbars are nested below the menu bar. When preferences are set to view toolbars attached to each open document, you’ll see multiple sets of toolbars. Toolbars are marked with a vertical separator bar at the left side of the toolbar. This bar can be selected and dragged to move it out of the Toolbar Well. CROSS-REF For information related to working with toolbars, see the “Tools and toolbars” section later in this chapter.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat L Attachments. The Attachments pane is used to show all file attachments in a document. CROSS-REF To learn how to use file attachments, see Chapter 12. M Comments panel. When you open the Comments panel, the display of comments and reviews is shown horizontally at the bottom of the Acrobat window. CROSS-REF To learn how to use the Comments panel options, see Chapter 20. N Navigation pane. The Navigation pane can be expanded or collapsed. The view in Figure 1.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat FIGURE 1.3 Recently opened files in Windows appear at the bottom of the File menu. Macintosh users can display a list of recently viewed files by choosing File ➪ Open Recent File. Edit menu As shown in Figure 1.4, the traditional Cut, Copy, and Paste commands are located in the Edit menu along with other familiar commands from Acrobat 7. There are no changes to the Edit menu from Acrobat 7. FIGURE 1.4 The Edit menu contains the same commands found in Acrobat 7.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat View menu The View menu (see Figure 1.5) contains all the commands you’ll use for viewing PDF documents. An addition to the View menu is the Reading Mode command. This command dismisses the Navigation pane and appears similar to the display you see when reading articles. The Wireframe command has changed to Line Weights you see at the bottom of the menu. CROSS-REF For more information on using Reading Mode, see Chapter 5. Document menu The Document menu (see Figure 1.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat FIGURE 1.6 The Document menu reflects several changes in Acrobat 8. Comments menu Some new menu commands in the Comments menu shown in Figure 1.7 include Send for Shared Review, Upload for Browser-Based Review, Search for Additional Services, and a number of different export commands for exporting comments to MS Word, AutoCAD, and to a data file. CROSS-REF For details on working with comment reviews, see Chapter 21.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat Forms menu The Forms menu shown in Figure 1.8 is new to Acrobat 8. Here you’ll find a number of different commands all used for working with PDF forms and Adobe Designer XML forms (Windows). NEW FEATURE The new Run Form Field Recognition command is not only a special treat for forms designers, but it’s one of the best new features added to Acrobat 8. FIGURE 1.8 The Forms menu, new in Acrobat 8, contains commands specifically for working with forms.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat have been made in this menu in Acrobat. You’ll notice the Security commands have changed a bit and a new command exists for enabling PDFs with Adobe Reader usage rights. Also notice the Document Processing menu command. From the submenu you find many command that were positioned directly under the Advanced command such as Batch Processing, And JavaScript commands. CROSS-REF For more information on using the Redaction tools, see Chapter 14. FIGURE 1.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat CROSS-REF For information related to window views and the split window views, see Chapter 5. Help menu The traditional help files added to your Acrobat folder at installation are found in the Help menu (see Figure 1.12). Various online help support is also located in this menu. You’ll note that the Detect and Repair command found in earlier versions of Acrobat has changed to Repair Acrobat Installation.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat FIGURE 1.13 To access a submenu, move the cursor to the command containing a right-pointing arrow and slide the cursor over to the submenu options. Click the desired command in the submenu to execute the command. Context menus Wherever you are in the Acrobat window — the toolbars, palettes, Document pane, or the Help menus — you can gain quick access to menu items related to your task by opening a context menu.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat If you change tools in a toolbar and open a context menu, the menu options change to reflect choices with that particular tool. Likewise, a context menu opened on a palette offers menu options respective to the palette, as shown in Figure 1.15. FIGURE 1.15 When a palette is open in the Navigation pane and you open a context menu, the menu options reflect tasks you can perform respective to the panel.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat Tools, task buttons, and toolbars Tools are grouped together in separate toolbars in the Toolbar Well below the menu bar. The default view when you launch Acrobat contains several toolbars visible in the Toolbar Well. You can remove various toolbars from the Well, move them around the Acrobat window, close them, and add different toolbars to the Toolbar Well.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat FIGURE 1.17 Open the More Tools window to show/hide tools in toolbars. Place a check mark beside any tool to be shown in a toolbar docked in the Toolbar Well or opened as a floating toolbar. Figure 1.17 shows you a small portion of available tools that appear in a scrollable window. Toolbars themselves can be shown or hidden using the More Tools window.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat FIGURE 1.18 Open a context menu on a toolbar and select Show/Hide Toolbars to open a submenu where all toolbars can be opened or temporarily closed. TIP If you want all tools within a given toolbar to be shown, select Show All Tools in the context menu. The Show/Hide menu command in the context menu shown in Figure 1.18 provides the same commands you have available in the View ➪ Toolbars submenu.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat FIGURE 1.19 The File toolbar contains tools for document handling, such as opening PDF documents, saving documents, and printing files. n Page Navigation toolbar. The default tools in the Page Navigation toolbar shown on the left in Figure 1.20 contain tools for moving back and forth between PDF document pages. The numbers indicate what page you are currently viewing out of the total number of pages in the document.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat FIGURE 1.22 Select & Zoom tools are used to select text/images, move a document around the Document pane, copy selections, and view the document page using a number of different zoom tools. n Find toolbar. Of all the default toolbars, the Find toolbar shown in Figure 1.23 is the only one that does not have additional tools that can be added to the toolbar. However, a pull-down menu exists for making choices to refine your search for words in an open PDF document.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat FIGURE 1.24 Toolbars can be docked on all four sides of the Acrobat window and undocked from the Toolbar Well where they appear as floating toolbars. D A B C n Resetting toolbars. You can position toolbars around the Acrobat window and return them to the default positions with one menu command.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat FIGURE 1.25 To return toolbars back to the default view, open a context menu from any toolbar or in the Toolbar Well and select Reset Toolbars. n Hiding all toolbars. Toolbars can be hidden from view to offer you more room when editing a PDF document or browsing the contents of PDFs. To hide the toolbars from view, open a context menu from the Toolbar Well and choose Hide Toolbars.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat You can also lock toolbars that are undocked outside of the Toolbar Well. The separator bar on the toolbar disappears on floating toolbars the same as it does for toolbars docked in the Toolbar Well. However, locking undocked toolbars does not prevent you from moving them around the Acrobat window. You can click and drag the title bar for any undocked toolbar and move it to another location. NOTE n Setting new toolbar defaults.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat comment markups and form fields. The Article tool is used to create article threads, the Crop, Link, 3D, Movie, and Sound tools follow. The TouchUp Text tool is used to edit text on a page and the last tool is the TouchUp Object tool that is used to select content that was originally created in an authoring program and converted to PDF. For more information about PDF editing using the Advanced Editing tools, see the chapters in Part III.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat FIGURE 1.28 The Edit toolbar contains a miscellaneous selection of tools used for spell checking and editing. Forms toolbar (Acrobat Professional only) From a context menu in the Toolbar Well or the View ➪ Toolbars submenu select Forms toolbar to open the Forms tools. The eight forms tools shown in Figure 1.29 opens where you can access tools to create form fields.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat CROSS-REF For a greater understanding about object and document metadata, see Chapter 5. For information on using the Object Data tool, see Chapter 9. FIGURE 1.31 Use the Object Data tool to select objects and view file attributes associated with the selected object. Print Production tools The Print Production tools (see Figure 1.32) enable you to make adjustments on the PDF or alter the content.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat FIGURE 1.34 The Typewriter tool is used primarily for filling in forms that don’t contain form fields. CROSS-REF For more information on using the Typewriter tools, see Chapter 33. Properties Bar You use the Properties Bar (see Figure 1.35) in conjunction with several different tools.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat STEPS: Setting up the Acrobat environment 1. Return to toolbar defaults. Open Acrobat. Position the cursor on any area in the Toolbar Well and right-click to open a context menu (Ctrl+click for Macintosh) and select Reset Toolbars. 2. Open the More Tools window. Open the More Tools menu. From a context menu opened from the Toolbar Well, select More Tools to open the More Tools window. 3. Add the tools you intend to use to the Comment & Markup toolbar.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat 8. Dock the toolbars. After opening all the toolbars you want to use for a given editing session return to the Toolbar Well context menu and select Dock All Toolbars. This command moves all the toolbars to the Toolbar Well, as shown in Figure 1.37. FIGURE 1.37 Toolbars docked in the Toolbar Well include the A) File toolbar, B) Select & Zoom toolbar, C) Advanced Editing toolbar, D) Edit toolbar, E) Comment & Markup toolbar, and F) the Properties Bar.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat As you become familiar with the tools, you can return to the context menu opened from the Toolbar Well and choose Button Labels ➪ No Labels. When No Labels is active, your toolbars shrink and offer you more room in the Toolbar Well. Palettes Other tools available to you in all Acrobat viewers are palettes.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat FIGURE 1.39 Thumbnails are found in the Pages pane in all Acrobat viewers. The thumbnail view of document pages can be sized larger and smaller using context menu commands. CROSS-REF For a complete description of working with pages (thumbnails), see Chapter 16. Bookmarks The second default palette panel in the Navigation pane is the Bookmark panel. You can save PDF documents in a manner where the bookmarks are visible when the file opens in Acrobat.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat Bookmarks are navigation buttons that can launch a page, a view, or one of many different Action types similar to link and button actions. Anyone familiar with Acrobat already knows much about bookmarks and how to navigate pages by clicking individual bookmarks in the palette. CROSS-REF To learn how to create and manage bookmarks and add actions, see Chapter 17. How To The How To pane has been moved from where it appeared in Acrobat 6 and 7.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat Attachments The Attachments pane (see Figure 1.42) in all Acrobat viewers is used to display, manage, and extract file attachments. You can attach files in Acrobat Standard and Professional and extract file attachments using all Acrobat viewers including Adobe Reader. FIGURE 1.42 The Attachments pane provides options for managing file attachments. Attachments can be extracted from within Adobe Reader.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat FIGURE 1.44 Open the Navigation Panels menu and a submenu displays all Navigation panels. FIGURE 1.45 Once Navigation panels have been docked in the Navigation pane, they appear in a context menu opened from the Navigation pane.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat The list includes the default panels. If you select a default panel, the Navigation pane opens and the panel is selected. When you select a hidden panel, in other words, a panel other than those docked in the Navigation pane when you first launch Acrobat, the panel opens in the Acrobat window as a floating palette with one or more panels contained in the window.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat Destinations Destinations work similarly to bookmarks, in that specific views are captured and listed in the panel. Clicking a destination opens the associated page in the Document pane, whereas clicking a bookmark opens the associated view (page and zoom). CROSS-REF For information on creating destinations and managing them, see Chapter 22. Fields The Fields panel enables you to manage form fields on Acrobat PDF forms.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat Model Tree The Model Tree palette lets you examine information related to 3D drawings. You can review assets, hide and show drawing parts, toggle views, review comments, and more on 3D drawings. In Figure 1.48 you can see the model tree shown for a 3D image. FIGURE 1.48 The Model Tree palette is designed to work with 3D drawings. CROSS-REF For more information about viewing 3D drawings and Acrobat 3D, see Chapter 2.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat Palette menus Each of the panels contains its own pull-down menu. When a panel is open in the Navigation pane or in a floating window, select the Options down-pointing arrow to open a pull-down menu, as shown in Figure 1.49. Menu commands found in panels may or may not be available from the top-level menu bar. Additionally, some panels, like the Attachments and Comments panels, offer you several pull-down menus. FIGURE 1.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat FIGURE 1.50 A context menu opened on a bookmark. FIGURE 1.51 When a page is selected in the Pages palette and a context menu is opened, more menu choices are available than when no page is selected. Accessing Help You can see the number of different commands and tools available in Acrobat are extraordinary — and you haven’t yet looked at all the submenu options or different preference options accessed from the top-level menu bar.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat Getting Started in Acrobat When you first launch Acrobat, the Getting Started window opens, as shown in Figure 1.52. This window provides a number of different help items that ease you into the world of Acrobat and PDF. FIGURE 1.52 When you first launch Acrobat 8, the Getting Started window opens. Click any one of the eight buttons in the Getting Started window and another pane respective to your selection opens where help information is provided.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat FIGURE 1.53 Click different topics in the How To pane in the Navigation pane to explore help information. Acrobat help The How To window contains a select group of common Acrobat features about which you can find help within the listed topics on the Homepage. However, Acrobat is a monster program with many features and listing all the methods for working in the program is not the purpose of the How To help pane.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat Search tab You can use the Search tab to find any word(s) in the help document. Click the Search tab and the Navigation pane changes to display a field box where you type your search criteria. Type one or more words in the field box and click Search. The results then appear in the Search tab. All text appearing in red is linked to the page that opens in the Topic pane. FIGURE 1.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat Adobe LiveCycle Designer Adobe LiveCycle Designer is a separate executable program available to Acrobat Professional users on Windows only. Designer is used for creating dynamic XML forms. Designer also has a help document to assist you in learning the program. To access the Help file, select Help ➪ Adobe LiveCycle Designer Help or press the F1 key. The help document shown in Figure 1.55 opens.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat When accessing Adobe’s Online Support, your Web browser opens in the foreground while Acrobat Professional remains open in the background. When you finish viewing Web pages and quit your Web browser, the Acrobat window returns to view. NOTE Acrobat User Community Adobe Systems sponsors a user group forum and supports the development of user groups internationally.
Part I Welcome to Adobe Acrobat Understanding Preferences Preferences enable you to customize your work sessions in Acrobat. You can access a Preferences dialog box from within any Acrobat viewer and from within a Web browser when viewing PDFs as inline views.
Getting to Know Adobe Acrobat Summary This chapter offers you a general introduction for working in both Acrobat Standard and Acrobat Professional and helps you understand the environment, the user interface, and some of the many new features added to the commercial Acrobat products. At the very least, you should know how to go about finding help when you first start working in the program.
