Law Technology

My Favorite Free PDF Tool? NONE of Them!

By Ross

My favorite free PDF converter is NONE of them. Actual Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro can be had surprisingly inexpensively. As we’ve written about before, you can go to eBay and buy a full copy of Acrobat 6 very inexpensively (anywhere from $30-$70) - that will entitle you to upgrade to 9 Pro from the Acrobat upgrade page for only $160.bu Another way also gets you a great scanner - Acrobat 9 Standard is bundled with Fujitsu’s popular ScanJet S510 which you can get for between $300 and $400 depending on available rebates and online discount codes (and then you can upgrade to 9 Pro, again for $160). Or with Fujitsu’s Mac ScanSnap S510M, you actually get Acrobat Pro 9 for OS X. There are few better software deals than inexpensively acquired Acrobat 9 Pro on the planet. Why?

• Security
• Security
• Did I mention security - you should secure all PDFs you create that are text-based to prevent recipients from altering or lifting your text and using it for God only knows what purpose
• Commenting and markup including stamping your signature, digital signatures, etc.
• PDF packing - think of it as the “electronic three ring binder” function - unbelievably useful
• PDF Optimizer to crunch down really big PDFs
• Bookmarking - invaluable, I use it EVERY day
• Bates stamping - tremendously flexible
• Headers and footers
• Secure redaction (to prevent nitwitted black highlighting from being revealed)
• Organizer - one click leads to addiction
• Fill-in form creation
• The Typewriter function (jaw-droppingly useful)
• Full-screen slideshow mode
• Creating searchable PDFs from scanned image PDFs (one at a time or in batches)
• Web page capture
• And the piece de la r
  ésistance, Acrobat integration with MS Office components and ESPECIALLY the integration with Outlook for saving entire mail folders with all their contents including attachments in a wonderfully organized, hyperlink bookmarked, searchable PDF file.

Have I been drinking the Acrobat Kool-Aid - you bet and it deserves to be lauded - most people SERIOUSLY underuse it. If anyone is interested, I would be happy to offer my Legal Acrobat training class as a webinar soon (just let me know).

It just seems that if you want to penny-pinch, it might be better to do it on something else.

Full post as published by Ross Ipsa Loquitur on January 05, 2009 (boomark / email).