What is PDF? Details 3

The PDF format includes full security features: you can disable printing, copying text, editing, or even viewing, to your heart's desire. Only users knowing the password would be able to change these settings. You can thus be sure that your intellectual property is safe, and you can use the PDF format for sensitive information. The print-disabling feature is useful for providing slide presentations online, printing which makes little sense (but tell that to the students). It can also help to ensure all students actually do familiarize themselves with the web, instead of asking others for printed copies. Text in Acrobat documents is fully searchable, in contrast to non-text formats such as TIFF, the fax-format. An Acrobat Catalog index on a server or CD-Rom also allows searching multiple documents. Acrobat forms can be much prettier than HTML forms, but can be linked up to CGI-scripts on a webserver just like an HTML form. You can design a form in a page-layout or word-processing program and print to PDF, then use Acrobat to activate the form features. Users with only Adobe Reader can fill in the form and print it or submit it to the server, but cannot save the filled-in form.

last updated: 2004-02-04— Instructional Technology Lab