Adobe Reader Blog

Today, we announced the availability of Adobe Reader and Acrobat XI (11.0.03), X (10.1.7) and 9.5.5. For more information regarding the security details in these releases, please see Security Bulletin APSB13-15. For detailed Release Notes, please see the Enterprise Toolkit.

Adobe Reader and Acrobat 9 EOL
As a reminder, Adobe Reader and Acrobat 9 End-of-Life will occur next month. As stated in the Adobe Support Lifecycle Policy, Adobe provides five years of product support from the general availability date of Adobe Reader and Adobe Acrobat. In line with that policy, support for Adobe Reader 9.x and Adobe Acrobat 9.x will end on June 26, 2013.

End of Support
End of Support means that Adobe will no longer provide technical support or distribute runtimes, including product and/or security updates, for all derivatives of a product or product version (e.g. localized versions, minor upgrades, operating systems, dot and double-dot releases, and connector products).

Recommendation to Customers/Users
Adobe strongly recommends that customers update to the latest versions of Adobe Reader at: http://get.adobe.com/reader. By updating installations to the latest versions, customers benefit from the latest functional enhancements and improved security measures.

Additional Resources
For more information on the Adobe Support Lifecycle Policy, visit: http://www.adobe.com/support/products/enterprise/eol. For a complete list of Adobe products and technical support periods covered under the policy, visit: http://www.adobe.com/support/products/enterprise/eol/eol_matrix.html.

Steve Gottwals, Group Product Manager, Adobe Reader

In our last post, we were talking about all the time-saving ways you could use Adobe’s online document services through Adobe Reader XI; now, we’d like to share just how to get that work done. But here’s the thing: there is no way to explain just how simple it is to use these services. Will that keep us from trying? No way. As soon as you catch on, feel free to open up Adobe Reader and try it yourself (we don’t think it will take you very long).

The key to using any of the services – with or without Adobe Reader – is your Adobe ID. It’s how you identify yourself to each service, and it’s how you sync all of your information between Reader, Reader Mobile, Acrobat.com, and any of the other services you’re using. (Don’t have one? Don’t worry. You can create one for free at any place you would otherwise sign in; you can even do so within Adobe Reader! Read on.) There are several ways to sign in from within Adobe Reader, but one of the quickest ways is to open up your Tools pane; here’s what that looks like:

1. Click on “Tools” in the upper right corner of the application.
2. Once the Tools pane is open, you’ll see a little blue bar at the top of the pane with a “Sign In” link. Click on that. (If you see your name there already, you’re already signed in – good work!)
3. A pop-up window will appear where you’ll be able to sign in. If you don’t have an Adobe ID, you can create one with that same pop-up window.

Easy, right? And now that you’re signed in, you can access any of the services in that Tools pane. All of your subscriptions are associated with your Adobe ID, so if you’ve subscribed to one or more of the services, you’ll have those paid options available to you. Otherwise, you’ll have access to the services at their free or trial level, where available (for more info on pricing, see: Acrobat.com, SendNow, ExportPDF, CreatePDF.). Here’s how to access each of the services from Reader:

1. Export a PDF file to Word or Excel by expanding the “Export PDF” panel. Choose the PDF file to convert (the document that’s currently open will be the default here), and choose the format you’d like to convert it to (.docx, .doc, .xls, or .rtf). Click on “Convert”, and watch the magic happen. When the conversion is finished, you’ll be prompted to save the converted file to your computer – or, if you prefer, directly to an Office 365 or SharePoint location. Want to give it a shot? Subscribe to ExportPDF.
2. Create a new PDF file by opening up the panel marked “Create PDF”; just click to choose the file you’d like to use. As with ExportPDF, you can choose from locations on your computer or from an online location. Now click “Convert”. Give Adobe Reader a few seconds to communicate with the CreatePDF servers, and voila – you’ll get a prompt to open the newly converted PDF file in Adobe Reader. Have we even had to leave Adobe Reader yet? No. Convert your own files by subscribing to CreatePDF.
3. When it comes to sending files with Adobe SendNow, you’ll see some options: choose the file and the recipient, and then write a message to be delivered along with the file. You can decide whether you’d like your recipient to sign in for access to the file; you can opt for delivery receipts to find out when the file has been downloaded; and you can limit the time that the file will be available for download. All without ever leaving the Adobe Reader window you’ve got open already. For the full range of features, try a SendNow subscription.
4. Finally, open up that last panel to upload the current document to Acrobat.com for secure storage and access from any device; the free service includes 2 GB of storage space and hooks into Adobe Reader Mobile for reading on the road. You don’t even need a subscription for this service; just use your Adobe ID to access your own cloud storage account.

When we told you that Adobe Reader wasn’t just for reading anymore, maybe you thought that we were being facetious. We were not: Adobe Reader XI grants you access to all these services and more, and all you need to get started is an Adobe ID. Time to give Adobe Reader another look, people; see what this software can do to amp up your workflow and inject some more time into your day by downloading it for free.

Adobe Reader has been around for a while now – nearly 20 years, in fact. In those two decades, there have been a lot of changes, both in the digital document industry and in Reader itself. The most recent incarnation of Adobe Reader is without a doubt the most robust version yet, thanks in no small part to the fact that this Reader is no longer just for reading. With Adobe Reader XI, we’re bringing your work tools to where you’re doing your work; we’ve added a new Tools pane to help you access our online document services quickly and easily from within the Reader interface. Here’s what we’ve included to help you get your work done:

• If you have a PDF file open and you want to make some changes to the content, you can export that PDF file to Word, Excel, and other formats using ExportPDF and continue your work in one of those natively editable formats. That includes scanned PDF files or image-only PDF files; even if you can’t search the file’s text, you can still export it. Instead of starting from scratch or manually copying and pasting text from the document, you can save time by converting to one of the formats that you edit documents with every day without skipping a beat.

• When it comes time to convert that file back to PDF or to combine several files into a single PDF document, open up the “Create PDF” panel from the Tools pane and take advantage of the CreatePDF service to do just that. You can use CreatePDF to create and combine multiple files online and store those documents in the cloud from wherever you may be, and you can do it from Adobe Reader with just a few clicks.

• When you’re looking at a PDF file that you want to distribute or share with colleagues and clients, you can send the document to them securely and track that document’s activity with Adobe SendNow. Your subscription will allow you to send documents of up to 2GB; you can even add custom branding to SendNow emails and download pages. Definitely beats sending a hard drive via overnight mail!

• What about those times when you’re halfway through a 200-page document but you’ve got to leave the office? With a single click you can upload that document to Acrobat.com and access the file (at whatever page you left it on) from the Acrobat.com folder in Adobe Reader Mobile for iOS or Android. Acrobat.com lets you access all of your files from virtually any device, whenever you need them; why stay bound to a desk when Adobe Reader can follow you wherever you go, and Acrobat.com always has your files stored securely in the cloud?

Adobe Reader XI makes all of this happen directly from the Tools pane, your personal portal to productivity. Take a look at your options by clicking on “Tools” in the upper right corner of Reader the next time you open a document; you’ll be amazed at the things you can do. All you need to get started is an Adobe ID, which is free to create; sign in or create your ID through the Tools pane to see what these services can do for you and your workflow.

Next week, we’ll get granular and go over the how-to for each of the tools available to you in Reader; tune in to get the good news!

Today, we announced the availability of Adobe Reader and Acrobat XI (11.0.02), X (10.1.6) and 9.5.4. For more information regarding the security details in these releases, please see Security Bulletin APSB13-07. For detailed Release Notes, please see the Enterprise Toolkit.

Steve Gottwals, Group Product Manager, Adobe Reader

Today, we announced the availability of Adobe Reader and Acrobat XI (11.0.01), X (10.1.5) and 9.5.3. For more information regarding the security details in these releases, please see Security Bulletin APSB13-02. For detailed Release Notes, please see the Enterprise Toolkit.

Adobe Reader XI Deployment Kit for App-V
With the 11.0.01 update, we’ve also released two tools to help virtualize Adobe Reader on Microsoft App-V. The tools include a Package Accelerator and an App-V Reader MSI, which installs a few DLLs and registry entries to support shell extensions, browser integration, and PDF ownership. The tools work with Reader 11.0.01 and App-V 4.6. See the App-V Deployment section of the Enterprise Administration Guide for more information.

New Updater Mode Added to Acrobat XI for Windows
Just like the Adobe Reader updater, the Adobe Acrobat XI for Windows updater now has a fully-automated mode. As a reminder, “fully-automated” mode will regularly check for important updates, download them to your machine, and install them automatically. When finished, you will be alerted via a small message in the system tray that your software has been updated. This method is the recommended best practice for keeping Adobe Acrobat up-to-date and more secure given the fact that it does not require user intervention.

Handling Flash in 10.1.5
As mentioned in Three Common Adobe Reader and Acrobat Security Questions, unknown Flash will now be rendered by the system Flash Player (NPAPI version), when using Adobe Reader and Acrobat 10.1.5. Note: This has already been done for Reader and Acrobat 11. As stated before, this means that Adobe Reader/Acrobat users will no longer have to update Adobe Reader/Acrobat each time we update the Flash Player. This is particularly beneficial to customers in managed environments, because fewer updates means a lower cost of ownership, while maintaining a vigilant security posture.

Adobe Reader and Acrobat 9 EOL
Please note, as stated in Adobe Reader and Acrobat 9 EOL, support for Adobe Reader 9.x and Adobe Acrobat 9.x will end on June 26, 2013.

Steve Gottwals, Group Product Manager, Adobe Reader

Earlier this week we released our first version of Adobe Reader for Windows 8 Tablets. Windows 8 is an interesting and great new update to the Windows experience, and we’re making a new native app to go with it. To learn more about it, read the full posting on our Reader Mobile blog: http://blogs.adobe.com/readermobile/2012/12/13/adobe-reader-for-windows-8-tablets/

Dennis Griffin
Principal Product Manager
Adobe Reader for Tablets and Smartphones

I’ve just posted a “Feature Preview” to the Reader Mobile blog for the Smart Zoom feature that we’re adding to our mobile versions of Reader, and wanted to share it here as well. I’ll be posting these previews periodically to let people know what we’re working on, and to get some early feedback. Take a look!

http://blogs.adobe.com/readermobile/2012/11/13/feature-preview-smart-zoom/

Dennis Griffin
Principal Product Manager
Adobe Reader for Tablets and Smartphones

Adobe Reader XI is now available! Download Reader XI today at http://get.adobe.com/reader. With over one billion downloads, Adobe Reader continues its leadership as the global standard in PDF viewing and interaction.

New Functionality
Adobe Reader XI provides full commenting capabilities, including text, stamps, file attachments and audio recordings, as well as drawing markups, like lines, arrows, shapes and free-form annotations. Do you have a PDF form that needs attention? Well, Reader is now able to fill, sign, save and send your forms without requiring printing and mailing. And, of course, you can do this on the most recent and popular operating systems, OS X Mountain Lion and Windows 8, which includes our new “touch-mode” for an optimal tablet experience.

Mobile and the Cloud
Wherever you are, save your PDFs to Acrobat.com for access from anywhere, including your mobile devices via Adobe Reader for Android and iOS. Also, leverage Adobe Reader XI’s integration with our cloud services, including creating PDF, exporting PDF files to Word and Excel, or sending your documents for signatures and full tracking via Adobe EchoSign.

Security
We really moved the needle with Protected Mode in Adobe Reader X. Now, we’ve enhanced Protected Mode in Adobe Reader XI to include data theft prevention capabilities. We’ve even added a new Protected View, which implements a separate desktop and winstation for the UI, providing an additional layer of defense. For high-risk environments, we’ve added the PDF Whitelisting Framework, which allows the selective enablement of JavaScript for both Windows and Mac OS, including support for certified documents. And, in the area of content security, we’ve expanded our support to elliptic curve cryptography.

Enterprise Deployment
We spent a lot of time with our Citrix XenApp support, and especially focused on performance, which is key when accessing Adobe Reader XI from your tablet devices. Also, if you’re rolling out application streaming, we’re now supporting Microsoft App-V, including a Package Accelerator. Need a GPO template? We’ve added that to this release too! And, of course, we continue to enhance our support for Microsoft SCCM/SCUP, Apple Remote Desktop and have even added a Configuration Wizard for the Mac. For all your enterprise questions, checkout our new Enterprise Toolkit.

As always your feedback and comments are critical to our success. Please continue to provide us with your feedback via the Adobe Reader user forums.

To learn more about the new Adobe Reader XI please visit our home page at www.adobe.com/products/reader.html. Follow Reader XI news on Twitter @Adobe_Reader.

Steve Gottwals, Group Product Manager, Adobe Reader

Today, Adobe is announcing our next generation Acrobat XI software with new cloud services. Products included in this release are: Acrobat XI Pro, Acrobat XI Standard, Adobe Reader XI and newly integrated documents services, Adobe FormsCentral and Adobe EchoSign.

Adobe Reader XI, our most powerful Reader yet, includes many new and enhanced capabilities:

• Productivity
  • Full commenting features, including text, stamps, file attachments and audio recordings, as well as drawing markups, like lines, arrows, shapes and free-form annotations
  • Fill, sign, save and send your forms – and save the planet while you’re at it!
  • Store files on Acrobat.com for access from multiple devices
  • Support for OS X Mountain Lion and Windows 8 with new “touch-mode” for optimal tablet interaction
  • Create PDF or Export PDF files to Word and Excel online
• Security
  • Enhanced Protected Mode now includes data theft prevention capabilities
  • New Protected View implements a separate desktop and winstation for the UI, which provides an additional layer of defense
  • PDF Whitelisting Framework allows selective enablement of JavaScript for both Windows and Mac OS
  • Elliptic Curve Cryptography support for digital signatures
• Enterprise Deployment
  • Citrix XenApp enhancements for better performance
  • New App-V support, including a Package Accelerator
  • GPO Template for the most common enterprise settings
  • Enhanced support for Microsoft SCCM/SCUP and Apple Remote Desktop
  • Configuration Wizard for the Mac

Stay tuned for an announcement about where you can download Reader XI soon!

Steve Gottwals, Group Product Manager, Adobe Reader

The Adobe Approved Trust List is a program that allows millions of users around the world to create digital signatures that are trusted whenever the signed document is opened in Adobe Reader or Acrobat software. Essentially, both Reader and Acrobat have been programmed to reach out to a web page to periodically download a list of trusted “root” digital certificates. Any digital signature created with a credential that can trace a relationship (“chain”) back to the high-assurance, trustworthy certificates on this list is trusted by Acrobat and Reader.

We just added several new members to the program! For a full list, or to try a sample document, visit: Adobe Approved Trust List Members. So, if you’re interested in obtaining an AATL-enabled certificate, contact one of the members. Or, if you’re interested in being a member of the AATL, you can send an email here.

Steve Gottwals, Group Product Manager, Adobe Reader