Digital Workshop

Hi
I would like to import and then launch six PDF documents in an Opus Pro Xe publication distributable on cd rom. Can anyone provide a step by step tutorial on how to do this?
Thank you very much in advance for your tips.

Hi Armindo
I understand that what you want to do is to produce a publication containing pdf files or launching pdf files. I like to help you but could you please tell me...
How do you want to present your pdf:

1-Inside Opus: You can produce a docview fields to present the pdf. Depending of how big the pdf are you can choose to present each pdf in a separate pages or all the pdf using the same page. You must be carefull with this aproach since pdf presented using docview inside an Opus publication sometimes do not launch in computers that are part of a network because sometimes the network admin disable some windows properties that are neccesary for the files to appears inside Opus.

2-Files are presented outside Opus using Adobe Acrobat. In this case the files are launched using a button

Let me know...
Cheers
German

I frequently include pdf files for viewing and printing. However, apart from what has been mentioned by German, there are some other considerations which I will mention later. I have never relied on DocView to display my pdf files -- no reason other than a preference to use alternatives.

1. My technique has been to include the pdf files as part of my installable pub so that they are installed into the same directory as the pub. Normally, I provide a button which launches the pdf file. This depends, of course, on the end-user having Adobe Reader on the computer. (Network access may be an issue here.)

2. After viewing the pdf files, the user can print from within Adobe Reader.

3. For printing pdf files, there is another option. This is a very effective utility developed and made available by one of our colleagues, SWAN. You can find a copy in The Lounge. He posted it on 20 Dec. I have used earlier versions of this with great success.

Now to a couple of important considerations.

1. In the "good old days" the only way to produce pdf files was to use Adobe Acrobat -- an expensive suite of programs, and a somewhat complex process -- for me anyway.

2. Now, there are several programs on the market that purport to convert a variety of file formats to pdf. My advice to you is to test these programs until you are happy that they perform as you want. I have encountered problems with a number of these, where the pdf file cannot be opened in Adobe Reader.

3. What works for me is this -- note: it might not suit you. I use many programs to output files that I eventually want to convert to pdf. These programs must be able to save files in RTF. If they cannot do that, I do not use them.

4. I take that RTF file and open it in WordPerfect 11. (I've tried a number of other word processors, but have failed to achieve consistent acceptable results. However, you may have more success.) I use WordPerfect's File > Publish To > PDF to create my pdf files. To date, I have not had a failure.

5. Another issue to be aware of is that some of the older versions of Adobe Reader (v 3 and earlier in particular) -- which your end-users might just happen to have on their computer -- will not open some of the more recent versions of pdf files.

6. In the past, Adobe seemed to be pretty liberal about letting developers distribute copies of Reader. This overcame the compatibility problem, because we could give them a recent copy that we knew worked with our files.

7. This are not quite so simple these days. Adobe require that you obtain a distribution licence and download a distributable copy of Reader. The licence is free, and there were no complications in downloading the 31MB distributable file.

I realise that the information I have outlined here might be peculiar to my requirements and the way in which I operate. I mention them in the hopes that they might be useful and save you time wasted on research and energy expended in frustration.

HTH

I too have used pdf files in my Opus publications for some years. I use a slightly different approach to the replies given here.

1. I use Open Office to produce my pdf documents. The output is in native pdf code and can be read by most of the software available today.

2. Adobe weren't being kind or 'liberal' in giving away their document reader. It was part of a carefully planned and very successful marketing strategy to establish brand dominance in software for producing shared public documents across the widest range of computer operating systems. Distribution of the reader helps Adobe to maintain its dominant market position, but there are an increasing number of competitors producing cheaper software doing a very similar job whilst maintaining compatibility with existing pdf formats.

3. To include several documents within Opus I use an index page showing the title of each document. Each title is hyperlinked to the document on the CD-ROM. When clicked the hyperlink opens the pdf file in a DocView frame on another page.

4. A front-end page contains buttons for 'Instructions/Help', 'Install Adobe Reader', 'Index Page' and 'Exit'. A free copy of the Adobe Reader is included on the CD-ROM. When installed it automatically links to the Adobe website for registration and updating, thus further helping Adobe's marketing and sales.

So, my project development approach is:

a) set up the front page
b) set up the Index page and hyperlinks for the pdf documents
c) set up the DocView page
d) copy pdf documents to a CD-ROM and test the program
e) copy the pdf documents to a Master CD-ROM
f) publish the program to the the Master CD-ROM and test
g) Distribute!

This approach has worked successfully over a wide range of projects over the past few years. Customers like the end result, so I must be doing something right!

Good luck with your projects.

Paul Conway
Opus 04 XE