Is PDF Dead as an Online Magazine Format?

XML is the future as far as document publishing standards go. I'm sure PDF will remain where people wish to restrict the (re)use of text and graphics, or at least give the impression that the reuse of text and graphicsis restricted.

What I *do* like about it is flexibility of design -- from my point of view strictly, as I'm just okay at HTML. It is very difficult to make a Web site that looks the same even on common browser/system variations. I suppose this depends on how much emphasis you place on the visual of the thing. I am more at home trying to realise design elements in Quark rather than farting around in HTML trying to generate unstable, second-rate approximations.

There's no rule that an entire magazine has to be one PDF file, anyway. A liberally illustrated single article in PDF could be made in 200k or so if you don't go crazy with hi-res colour images. For saving that one files, you would get all images and fonts embedded and a look that definitely reflects the designerss intent rather than the vagaries of your browser and system.

Actually, I'm not really sure about all this. I'm just throwing some thoughts out.

Well, it's impossible if you mean pixel-for-pixel identical. The history of HTML can be seen as a fight between those "designers" who wanted pixel-perfect control over the rendering of every page element, and those who wanted to maintain HTML's original aim, as a language which could produce understandable output on a variety of different systems with different display capabilities.

(I remember using Netscape in black and white, back in the dim and distant past)

The problem, I think, is that internally pdfs use Postscript (or, at least, someone told me they do. I've never checked. Bear with me on this one) and, if you've ever looked at the guts of a Postscript file, you'll see that the document text is all cut up into little bits and interspersed with bits of layout code. It's far less readable than HTML just because Postscript is much lower-level.

I think I probably asked the wrong question, sort of. It should have been, Do you like the PDF format? Or even, What would your ideal format for an online magazine style presentation be?

I'm fishing for ideas, because right now I barely even have a concept, to be honest.

If you're thinking of doing a webzine in PDF format, you should at least have an HTML option.

However, I want to do *something* -- something a bit more than just a personal Web page/blog, which is okay as far as it goes... that being, hardly anyone looks at it and it's kind of restrictive in terms of what can be done... no real creative satisfaction.

What I'm interested in doing is some kind of magazine thingy with a theme around media/art/literature/music/whatever. (A tiny bit of comics not ruled out.) All the things that interest me. I've done things in that past that were about just one thing in particular -- there was always a reward in seeing a finished product, but sometimes the content did get a bit boring/narrow.

I didn't necessarily see HTML as a format that played to my strengths (such as they are) very much. Maybe it doesn't matter. I need something that makes me feel useful and productive again. I might have to take the sinful step of getting a job I don't want fairly soon, but beyond that I'd like to do something worthwhile...

A lot of "developments" of HTML have been about muddying up the original concept of HTML, which is to provide CONTENT and links between segments of that content. It was never meant to be about APPEARANCE and def never meant to be about LAYOUT. It looks like we might be getting back to that original concept with XML and XSLTs etc, but I'm not holding my breath.

PDF on the other hand was designed from the other end -- it *was* designed to encapsulate appearance and layout -- the content was never (originally) a priority (and indeed it's still an arse to get it out of there, depending on the PDF creation route). There is (as i understand) an XML content layer being developed (or in there now, not sure) but if that's ever exploited it will also depend on the PDF creation route.

PDFs are not all the same either, there are many ways to embed fonts (or not), and embed pictures, and often people who make them aren't sure what the right options are for the medium the PDF is intended for.

On the web you can have a PDF with high JPEG compression, low-resolution, with minimal font embedding (for "unusual" fonts) and "byte-served" which means the PDF is downloaded on an "as needed" basis, rather than downloading the whole doc before you look at an individual page.

You can also optimise PDF for searching (and you can do control-F to find in a PDF in reader, not sure about browser plug-ins) and you CAN generate indexes of a folder of PDFs too. All these are possible. Just rarely does anyone ever do it all when they make the PDF.

OK, apparently I do have Acrobat on my laptop (if I can't see the icon on my desktop, I don't know how to find it). But I have here an editing test on PDF, but can't get the damn file out of Read-Only format -- the best I can do is convert it to text-only and edit that. What can I otherwise do?

You can try "Save As...", give it a new name, open that, and maybe it won't be read-only any more. Otherwise I don't know.

OK, I tried "Save a Copy" ("Save as" doesn't appear in the File dropdown), but it will only let me save the original, I don't have the right Acrobat versions to do more. Thanks TH.

Try CutePdf (if you are using Windows):
http://www.cutepdf.com/Products/CutePDF/writer.asp

I don't recall how well it works, I haven't dealt with editing a .pdf for a while.

CutePDF will save any printable document as a PDF.

Two suggestions: Make sure it is opening with Acrobat and not Adobe Reader - don't click the file to open it, but instead start Acrobat then use File|Open to browse to the file and open it.

If your laptop is running Windows, use Windows Explorer, right-click on the file and open the Properties tab. Clear the Read Only attribute checkbox.

Thanks, but I've already done 3 pages and I'm not going back.

kind of weird to give you an editing test in that format given how annoying it is to convert.

maybe that IS the test!

well FAIL then.

I had one PDF test in-person last month and the department head also gave me a hard copy and said "just mark that up if you want."

I have several rare books as pdf files but hate reading off of my monitor. Are there any elegant apps or other solutions for reading these things?

Printing them out? That was what pdf was originally designed for, IIRC.

Yes...

I really hate when there is a festival or something on and they only put the programme online as a PDF rather than normal HTML. It is invariably a PDF that only makes sense if you print it, often only if you print it double sided (and staple it in the middle).

Does anyone know a good substitute for the official Adobe PDF plugin for Firefox?

Do you use a Mac?

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/7518

No, I use a Win XP laptop.

Foxit

http://www.foxitsoftware.com/pdf/reader/

Thanks.

Adamrl: goodreader on iPhone/ipad.