Opening & Editing PDFs
How do I open documents with Acrobat Reader software?
If you are looking at a web page and want to view a document that is formatted in PDF, simply click the link to that document. Acrobat Reader 4.0 will automatically open the document in the PDF file format. Other versions of Acrobat Reader may ask you whether you want to “open” or “save” the file first. You can do either, but if you open it, you may not be able to save the file to a location in your computer.
If you have saved Acrobat Reader files to a location in your computer, you can open them later by opening up Acrobat Reader and using the toolbar to open a file (just as you do in word processing software).
You can also use Windows Explorer to find the file and double click on it. This should cause Acrobat Reader 4.0 to automatically open the document. Earlier versions might cause a prompt to appear asking what file format you want to use to open the document. If this happens, mark “Acrobat” with the cursor and then click “Okay.”
What do all of those tools in the toolbar of Acrobat Reader do if you can’t use them to edit documents?
Some of the tools on the toolbar should look familiar to you –e.g., the tool for opening and printing documents. Here are the basic Acrobat Reader tools:
Acrobat Reader has a “navigation pane” that lets you jump between pages of a single document. Click the icon to hide or show this view. Double click the page number to go to that page. This is a convenient way to move around large documents.
Acrobat Reader also has a “zoom” tool (the magnifying glass) that lets you enlarge the text of what you are reading. Click the icon and then a magnifying glass will appear. Click the magnifying glass until the text is the size you want it to be. In order to go back to smaller text, use the page icons on the right side of the toolbar.
Although you cannot edit documents, Acrobat Reader does permit you to select text and copy it to a word processing document (where you could edit it). Click the “T” icon to make the text selection tool appear. Drag the cursor over the text that you want to select and use the editing tools to copy and paste.
You can also search most Acrobat Reader documents with the icon that looks like a binocular. Click once and a screen will pop up to ask you to type in search terms.
Other Acrobat Reader tools (located in the editing tools at the top of the page) help to navigate within and between documents, and to vary the view.
Page 1 Overview
Page 2 What a PDF is
Page 3 Downloading the PDF Reader
Page 4 Installing the PDF Reader
Page 5 Opening and Editing PDFs
Page Content: Barbara Ryland