Adobe Acrobat 7.0: A Feature-Packed Acrobat Upgrade New and Improved in Version 7.0 Gerry Blackwell
For many small businesses, Acrobat, the document exchange tool from Adobe Systems Inc., is mission-critical. Lawyers, engineering consultants, architects, and publishers, to name just a few, use it routinely to create PDF (Portable Document Format) files to secure documents for electronic distribution and collaborative editing.
With the release of Acrobat 7.0 Professional, Adobe has created a significant upgrade to the existing product. Those familiar with previous versions will welcome many of the changes and improvements. They include new document creation, usage rights, document security, forms authoring, and management and print production options.
In fact, function bloat may soon be a problem. Anyone new to Acrobat will certainly find the range of options and features more bewildering than they would have with earlier versions. In our testing of the product, we found some other minor annoyances as well. On the whole, though, this is a very positive upgrade.
Acrobat Basics
Acrobat lets you create PDF files, including interactive forms, from documents created in a range of different programs — in many cases with a single click from a menu item or toolbar button within the originating program. The resulting file retains all the formatting, fonts, and graphics of the original. Recipients can open and view it using free downloadable Adobe Reader software.
The main Acrobat program includes tools for creating PDFs from a variety of sources, commenting on and marking up PDFs, sending them out for review, preparing them for print production, electronically signing them, and setting security policies for a range of documents or settings for individual files.
Once you create a PDF file, you can choose to lock a file so that it: cannot be changed by anyone, requires a password for viewing and/or editing, allows unauthenticated recipients to make only some changes using Acrobat or Acrobat Reader (add a signature or comments, for example), or allows anyone full editing privileges.
New and Powerful
Adobe Designer, one of the most powerful new features included with Acrobat Version 7.0 Professional, provides sophisticated tools for designing interactive PDF forms from scratch. You can do this from a variety of templates or from an existing non-interactive form. Recipients can fill in Acrobat forms on a computer using Acrobat Reader and transmit them by e-mail, print them out, or print the form and fill it out by hand.
If you use Acrobat a lot, you'll likely be most impressed with the Adobe Designer's forms authoring and management functions and the new review/mark-up capabilities that facilitate online e-mail and browser review processes. But the addition that the widest range of people will find most useful is the new document creation features.
Acrobat provides plug-ins that let you create PDFs with a single click without leaving the program. The list of programs that support the one-click feature now includes Microsoft Office, Project, Access, Internet Explorer, Visio, and Publisher, as well as Autodesk AutoCAD. Adobe says Word documents convert faster now as well, though in our tests it took well over 30 seconds to complete the conversion of a half-page document.
In Outlook, you can now convert single or multiple messages or complete folders. As with most of the other program plug-ins, the Acrobat install program adds a new toolbar at the top of the Outlook screen that includes three buttons — for converting selected messages, converting the current folder, or converting selected messages and adding them to an existing PDF.
When you click one of the buttons, a save-file-as dialog pops up. You enter a new file name, select a folder in which to save it, and Acrobat does the conversion. When the conversion is complete, the plug-in launches the Acrobat viewer and displays the new file. Simple.
Pass It On — Merge and Comment features let you work collaboratively via e-mail. Mark up and edit documents and send the pdf on to the next person for comments. Track and Merge lets you incorporate the groups comments into the final document.
