
Thank you, Adobe Reader 9 - nickb
http://blog.micropledge.com/2008/07/adobe-reader-9/
======
notauser
It's a real disaster that Adobe Reader sucks so much. PDF is a wonderful
document format - other readers open it in seconds and it works on everything
(including Linux, OS X and most phones). But thanks to Adobe if you ever send
a PDF file to a windows user you get a five minute rant about how much PDF
sucks and can you send it as a wonderful, efficient docx instead :/

~~~
eru
<http://www.complang.tuwien.ac.at/anton/why-not-pdf.html>

Synopsis: PS or PS.gz is even better than pdf.

~~~
wmf
Not for portability. Do most Windows users have PS viewers installed?

~~~
eru
That's right. And that's why I did not write it as my own opinion. 'Social'
reasons make pdf better in this regard.

I still prefer html for reading on-screen, though.

------
JesseAldridge
And suddenly Stallman doesn't sound so crazy.

------
markbao
Mac OS X Leopard users:

[spacebar]

~~~
saurabh
Now Linux users can too! <http://sourceforge.net/projects/gloobus>

------
peakok
Don't forget to get Foxit reader if you don't have it yet :
<http://www.foxitsoftware.com/>

~~~
markbao
Woah, since when did Foxit Reader become not free?

------
prakash
<http://diveintomark.org/archives/2008/07/04/adobe-9>

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apu
Are there any linux tools to mark-up/comment-on PDFs? I'm often forced to use
the windows version of Acrobat to make and view edits on a document, because I
haven't found any linux tools that will even display comments (let alone edit
them).

~~~
jauco
<http://annotations.diariolinux.com/>

------
dizz
Mac: <Spacebar> or Preview or indeed Skim... slim and functional, thank you!
:-)

------
lpgauth
How can it possibly need 210 MB?

~~~
trajan
There is a lot of support for niche features (3D, etc) pushed into the base
reader because it provides a significant business advantage to Adobe.

For example, they stand to benefit tremendously if a government agency decides
to go with PDF as their document review format over Autodesk's DWF. The fact
that the average consumer already has everything they need to use these
solutions is a big bullet point in their favor.

They don't stand to lose much if some picky internet folk (not criticizing -
I'm one too) decide to use a free alternative because Acrobat's too heavy.

~~~
bdotdub
Why can't they allow you to add in these features if you want these features?

There's no reason why the users should be forced to install all these bloaty
features.

------
chaostheory
on the bright side it's good news for AIR developers since AIR is part of this
bundle

------
sant0sk1
another satisfied customer:
[http://gusmueller.com/blog/archives/2008/07/adobe_reader_9_i...](http://gusmueller.com/blog/archives/2008/07/adobe_reader_9_is_out!.html)

~~~
st3fan
What cracks me up is the ReadMe.html that is being installed next to the
application. Do they have so little faith in their own PDF format that they
decided to use an HTML file?

~~~
raganwald
In all fairness, if the read me contains information about what to do when you
can't get the application working...

It would be a huge WTF if the only way to find out why you can't read PDF
files is locked inside a PDF file :-)

------
lst
Thinking of it: so PDF maybe stands for (Hidden) Proprietary Document Format?

(In the sense of: you will never ever be able to desire all of our features we
are continuously adding to our Take-Over-The-World-Document-Format?)

I'm confused.

~~~
nailer
PDF is an open spec. Adobe's viewer sucking is a separate issue.

~~~
lst
Do you know the whole story? PDF has not been created by users, but by a
company.

Only _now_ we have seen it changing into an ISO standard.

(Originally, Adobe only wanted to see it universally used to sell their PDF
writers: please read for free, and please please pay for writing it. Only that
it didn't happen this way.)

