Lori DeFurio

November 06, 2007

PDF iFilter 8 - 64-bit Support - LIVE on Labs!

Acrobat team has just posted on Adobe Labs an update to PDF iFilter 8 which enables 64-bit system support, specifically Windows 2003 with SharePoint 2007.
Take a look - and if you have feedback or questions - there is a new forum available as well

October 23, 2007

ANNOUNCEMENT: Update for Acrobat/Reader (8.1.1) available today

The latest update for Acrobat and Adobe Reader is available now. This release addresses a security vulnerability on Windows recently identified in addition to some other issues (i.e. bugs) identified on both Macintosh and Windows versions.
Downloads:
Adobe Reader 8.1.1 (Windows)
Adobe Reader 8.1.1 (Macintosh)
Adobe Acrobat Professional 8.1.1 (Macintosh)
Adobe Acrobat Professional & Standard 8.1.1 (Windows)
Adobe Acrobat 3D 8.1.1 (Windows)

Just In...

5:00 pm Tuesday, Oct 23: The auto updater is now working for both Acrobat and Reader.

September 25, 2007

Next up ... Adobe MAX

Adobe is hosting three Adobe MAX 2007 conferences this year:
North America: Chicago which starts on Sunday
Europe: Barcelona starting October 15 and
Japan: Tokyo on November 1 and 2.

I'm excited to return to MAX this year, attending in both North America and Europe, hosting a hands-on session called "I didn't know you could do that!" and hanging out at the Acrobat User Community stand. At our kick-off event in Chicago, there are multiple sessions dedicated to Acrobat and/or PDF – Jim King is going to cover standards; Thom Parker has a great talk entitled Pimp my PDF, where he will cover how to jazz up your audience's PDF experience. This session is not to be missed! And as Johnny L mentions in his blog, the sneak peek session is always a highlight.

If you're attending, please feel free to track me down.

September 20, 2007

Supported PDF functionality - Mac OS 10.4

I'm always being asked -- how does the implementation of PDF on my Mac compare to what Adobe offers in Acrobat and Adobe Reader. So, I went to PDF guru, Leonard Rosenthol , and he prepared a chart, which I then jazzed up using InDesign to create layers and added interactive buttons in Acrobat to allow you to select different views of the document to see what Apple can Read/Write, Read Only, or have Partially Implemented on the Mac platform (OS 10.4/Tiger). And I've outlined what is not supported at all

.
      Figure 1. Default view                              Figure 2. All white items are unsupported

As background information - the PDF Specification - version 1.x through 1.7 - has been published by Adobe and made freely available on our website. Vendors choose to implement features/functionality as it makes sense for their use.

And of course... if there is an error in this chart, please let me know.

July 06, 2007

AcrobatUsers.com members exceeds 15K

As of July 1st, AcrobatUsers.com now has over 15,000 members registered. Most of these members also belong to an Acrobat Chapter in one of 20 cities around the world. Our NYC chapter is #1 in total registered members, and will be holding their July meeting on Tuesday. The guest speaker is Mike Richmond from Adobe. If you want to attend via the web - drop by http://adobechats.adobe.acrobat.com/nyc02 at 12:30 pm ET on Tuesday, July 10th. The Dallas chapter is creeping up on NYC with a 30% overall increase in members during June to a total of almost 800 members. I'm going to make a trip to Dallas in the fall to visit this very active group.

Congratulations to Orlando - our newest chapter, and the chapter with the greatest growth in June. I spoke at their inaugural meeting on June 19th. When I arrived in Orlando (late afternoon) it was 97 degrees and humid! The evening was a blast! We had an excellent turnout and great pizza from a local vendor.
As we move into the summer, there will be less face-to-face meetings however, be sure to check back at the website to see who's hosting online meetings via Acrobat Connect.

June 13, 2007

Font Packs to use with Acrobat or Reader 8

If you're having trouble finding the Asian Font Packs and/or the European Extended Font Pack for Acrobat/Reader 8 on Adobe.com - not to worry. They're on our FTP site now as MSI files, and will be posted on Adobe.com later this summer as full installers (similar to Acrobat 7).
The Eastern European Font Pack includes Thai, Hebrew, and Arabic.
The Asian fonts - Chinese Simplified, Chinese Traditional, Japanese, and Korean are each in their own MSI file.

Please note: with these MSI files - you must copy the MSI installer to an empty directory and then run the installer from that directory. We've seen problems if there are other files in the directory. This is only an issue with the MSI files - this will not be a problem when we get the files posted on Adobe.com as full installers.

June 05, 2007

ANNOUNCEMENT: Acrobat 8.1 available today

As of today, an update to Acrobat 8, upgrading Acrobat 8 to Acrobat 8.1 (Professional & Standard) is available via Adobe Updater (in Acrobat). A download on Adobe.com will be available later this month (I'll update you when it is live)

The 8.1 release works with Microsoft Office 2007 and Microsoft Vista. Both PDF as a file format and Acrobat as an application are now "first class" citizens in these environments.

In Office 2007 - we are conforming to the new ribbon UI and are fully integrated. (Figure 1)

Figure 1. Acrobat Ribbon in Microsoft Word 2007

In MSFT Vista - PDF will preview similar to other supported file formats, and of course, you can create PDF by simply right clicking on supported file formats (Word, Excel, PPT, JPG, etc.) (Figure 2)

Figure 2. Right-click on any supported application in Microsoft Vista to create Adobe PDF.

My favorite integration with Office 2007 is with Outlook 2007. Now, when you open an email message in preview mode that has a PDF attachment – you see the PDF in the preview pane. You can view full page, or page width, and even navigate multi-page files. (Figure 3)

Figure 3. PDF Preview in Outlook 2007.

Also - at the request of our customer base, we're supporting 64-bit Citrix and Windows environments. Acrobat is still a 32-bit application, but for folks running 64-bit Citrix environments, or who load Acrobat on a 64-bit Windows system, Acrobat will work as advertised.

For additional information, I recommend you review http://www.adobe.com/acrobat and http://www.acrobatusers.com/ for articles and tips from our contributors on the updates in Acrobat 8.1.

Adobe Reader 8.1 is also available today.

More…

April 14, 2007

Announcement: Activities at AIIM/OnDemand

This week is the annual AIIM/OnDemand conference. The conference will be at the new Boston Convention Center, and Adobe has quite a few activities planned. Three events that don't require a conference pass include:

• Acrobat Developer Workshop on Wednesday afternoon, hosted by Joel Geraci, Technical Evangelist, Acrobat/PDF


• Adobe User Group meeting on Thursday morning, hosted by Ali Hanyaloglu and I


• Creative Suite 3 Deep Dive, either Tuesday afternoon or Wednesday morning, presented by Tim Plumer.
  

March 28, 2007

Acrobat 3D Version 8 live on Adobe Labs

There's a first time for everything... I'm happy to see our first Acrobat family product on Adobe Labs! Acrobat 3D Version 8 is the next generation version incorporating the excellent technology acquired from TTF in early 2006. Take it for a drive!

Announcement: AEC Seminar Series

Clearly, I'm not an expert in the area of AEC (Architecture, Engineering, Construction) but I wanted to alert you to this 4-part seminar series on Acrobat for industries focused on 2D and 3D designs. Each session is just 30 minutes and held via Acrobat Connect, so you can watch in the comfort of your office. In addition to these 4 30-minute segments starting tomorrow (Wed, March 28), there is a bonus 2-hour recap (in case you missed one, or you just want to do it all in one day) on May 2nd. Please see this web page for information and registration.

March 12, 2007

Adobe Acrobat for IT Professionals eSeminar Series

Joel Geraci, our Acrobat/PDF Technical Evangelist, is hosting 5 eSeminars to address topics of interest to IT professionals and Acrobat/PDF developers: Security, Collaboration Best Practices, JavaScript & Forms, and the Acrobat SDK. These seminars will run from March 21 - June 13 on Wednesdays at 9:00 am Pacific.
More information and registration information is available here.

March 08, 2007

Acrobat 8 ACE is available now

The Acrobat 8 ACE exam is now available. For Acrobat 7 we offered two exams (Print Production and LiveCycle Designer), however, we now consolidated into one Acrobat 8 test. There will be a recertification exam (testing on just the new features, via the internet) in a few weeks, and the full exam is now available at testing centers.
For more information see - http://www.adobe.com/support/certification/ace.html.
The exam prep guide hasn't yet been posted yet on Adobe.com so I've attached a copy here.
Good Luck - and let me know if you're Certified on Acrobat 8 - I'll promote it here.

March 06, 2007

PDF Conference Online

North American-based Acrobat & PDF Conferences have been in existence for years -- I went to my very first conference in San Diego in 2000 as a brand new Acrobat Evangelist. As technology has evolved, I've seen a shift in the needs of the Acrobat and PDF community from large, annual events to smaller more focused activities, and now, web-based events.
On March 20 & 21, I'm participating in the first ever online PDF Conference. Entitled Optimize Your Workflow with PDF Forms, the two 3-hour sessions will be entirely on Forms - how to create forms; how to collect data; how to add JavaScript.
And the conference will wrap up with Power Panel session -- a group of experts available for real-time responses to the audience questions.
I'll be there... will you?

February 14, 2007

Creating a custom dynamic stamp

I've had a tip on creating a custom dynamic stamp posted since the release of Acrobat 6. However, I continue get additional questions on configuration, different versions, when to place the dynamic content, etc. I've updated the written tip to include Acrobat 6, 7, and 8 configuration and I've just added a brief video presentation to demonstrate the steps.
Look for more interactive tips in coming weeks, and if you have a suggestion for a tip, let me know.

AcrobatUsers.com Turns One

Today marks the one year anniversary for AcrobatUsers.com. If you haven't had the chance to visit yet - please stop by. If you've been following us this year - we appreciate the support. We have over 10, 000 registered members, 18 chapters, and lots of new functionality introduced in recent months. I appreciate the tireless efforts of our bloggers and "Ask the Expert" contributors.
My personal goal for 2007 is to have a portal for Acrobat Connect users and content localized for non-English speaking members.
Happy Birthday AcrobatUsers.com
(and Happy Valentine's Day to each of you)

January 29, 2007

PDF University 2007 in Miami Beach

The 2nd annual PDF University will be held in Miami Beach Feb 28 - Mar 3. I'll be there to present in the track PDF for Document Publishing. I will focus on what's new in Acrobat 8 as it relates to a business user.

To kick off this track, I'm hosting an Adobe User Group breakfast (full breakfast - not just danish) at the convention center @ 7:30 am on March 2nd. Registration and Room Location to follow. With the co-location of The Creative Suite Conference, I expect we'll get folks from the InDesign crowd as well.

As always, we'll give an update on what's happening at Adobe, answer lots of questions, and of course, raffle off some fun gifts.