Duff Johnson’s PDF Perspective

Since my previous post, I’ve received a couple of comments from users suggesting websites and forums with PDF resources in languages other than English.  To give this idea a higher profile, I’ve created a page for it. I’ll update this page whenever I learn of a new non-English site dedicated to matters PDF.  Keep them coming!

I want to begin highlighting 3rd party sources of information about PDF technology, and one important place to start is with non-English language sources.

Today, I’ll mention two such well-established established sites that provide lots of valuable information in languages other than English. Critically, both sites include forums in which users can ask questions and get answers in their native languages.

pdfzone.de (German)
PDFLab (Italian)

If you know of other such sources, please email me (duff a-t document-solutions.com) or comment on this post, and I’ll be happy to compile a list.

Finally, news that color e-ink is real. 

The crucial paragraph (but it’s all good):

The image is designed to be comparable to print quality, LG.Philips said. The display is less than 300 micrometers thick, and only uses power when the image changes. 

Graphic designers, your jobs are secure.  The future of PDF?  Bright indeed.

Welcome to the Display for the 21st century.

Organized by Christopher Smith’s AGI (recently acquired by Aquent), last week’s 2007 Adobe Acrobat PDF Conference in Orlando, Florida was a notable success.  The co-location with the CRE8 conference for graphic designers expanded the scope to the benefit of all attendees.

The Scene

From the opening welcome party complete with Mickey Mouse and open bar, to Al Gore, Marissa Mayer and the mid-conference networking party (also well lubricated) to many fine sessions including the Acrobat Alternatives melee and rowdy Power Panel, this conference was both educational and highly enjoyable.  Adobe offered a very tasty (if very early!) Thursday breakfast for members of Adobe’s Acrobat User Groups.

The Keynotes

While the PDF Conference may be one of the smaller platforms for Al Gore’s famous presentation on global climate change, the former US Vice President gave it his all. He delivered a convincing demonstration of both the facts of our planetary predicament and his passion in communicating on the subject.  More than a few attendees noted a substantial improvement in the former Veep’s silhouette.  Having cut a Hitchcockian figure at the recent Academy Awards, Gore has clearly been working the problem in the gym.  Let’s just say he was inspiring in more ways than one!

Regrettably, Mr. Gore didn’t spend much time discussing PDF (his preference for presentations is Apple’s Keynote), but he did take note of FormRouter’s GreenPDF initiative.  Don’t print it; PDF it instead, and help control global climate change!

Google’s Marissa Mayer, Vice President for Search Products & User Experience, enraptured the crowd with a simple but telling survey of the company’s activities. Her presentation described how Google’s goals are organized around the concept of “responsiveness”, which Google measures in microseconds and considers a (if not the) key metric in almost every application.  Just how they get their servers to respond faster than my tricked-out Windoze machine can do locally, I suspect I’ll never know.  I’m just glad I bought the stock.

From Section 508 to copy-and-paste

Nettie Hartsock of Planet PDF managed to endure my own session without (it seems) terminal boredom.  It’s not easy to make PDF accessibility a scintillating subject, but I had an attentive audience, one several times larger than last year’s talk on the same subject.

The benefits of accessible PDF extend well beyond disabled users, and folks appear to be catching on, even outside Washington.  There was a great deal of interest in how PDF accessibility affects search-engine performance, and a lot of nodding heads when I described how and why PDF files are characteristically ignored by web content managers.  I’ve posted my presentation (pdf, 555 kb) for your reading pleasure.

Other News

Adobe has posted a Vista FAQ answering (in part) the growing chorus of users wondering when Acrobat 8 will work properly under Vista.  I may now quote Adobe as stating that: “In the first half of 2007, we [Adobe] expect to issue a free update to Acrobat 8 to support Vista.”

I learn something (in fact, usually two or more somethings) at every single PDF event. Last week’s Adobe Acrobat PDF Conference in Orlando was no exception, and I’m not talking about Al Gore’s magnetic presentation on global climate change.

This tip is really worth the mention because it is so simple, yet of real value to those who deliver PDFs for presentation purposes.  That’s a lot of folks (although not including Gore, who uses Apple’s Keynote).

(A BIG thank-you to Adobe Systems PDF Developer Evangelist Joel Geraci for this tip, and especially for not rubbing my nose in the fact that the solution was so near-to-hand!)

OK, perhaps you are wondering about my problem.  Let’s take a look.

Open any PDF using Adobe Acrobat or Reader 8.  Unless you view it in full-screen mode, you are very likely seeing a set of icons to the left side of the page - icons almost as big and loud as the copies I’ve posted here on the left.

In version 8, these icons provide access to a variety of systems that may be available within the document. The most familiar of these Navigation Panes are bookmarks and thumbnails, but there are at least 14 altogether, not including “auxiliary” panes. Click on a navigation pane button and the corresponding pane opens to the right.

Prior to version 8, navigation pane buttons consisted of tiny demure gray folders with overlapping hard-to-read labels nestled together on the upper left edge of the page.  The design didn’t really help users switch between panes, but these little labels were so small and quiet they made virtually no impact on the presentation of the page, and were easily ignored.

Acrobat 8 introduced a much wider Navigation Panel Button bar, with big, brassy icons… but no obvious way to turn them OFF.  Yes, you can right-click, Hide and Save each file, but that’s far too much like real WORK, and it can’t be done in batch, nor from a menu item, nor with a (published) javascript.  In short, it’s Not Obvious, and it should be.

This is where Joel’s Acrobat 8 Tip of the Month Award comes in.

To HIDE the Navigation Pane Buttons, so your uses don’t suffer them when you don’t want them to, simply check Hide Window Controls in the Document Properties (Control-D) Initial View dialog.  In Acrobat 8, this switch has effect of hiding both the navigation pane buttons AND the split-window icon and vertical scroll bar on the right side of the page. Critically, this feature may be managed on any number of PDF files at once using a simple Batch Process in Acrobat Professional.

Thanks, Joel!