I agree in theory. But practically, what other choice is there? HTML is OK, but for most people there isn’t a very easy way to create a clean HTML document containing images, figures, tables, etc. And there is no standardized way to encapsulate an entire page into a single file (including all graphics) so it can be saved or e-mailed. Word documents are designed for printing, so they still have arbitrary page breaks and fixed width (e.g. if you zoom in, you have to scroll horizontally to see the end of the line).
PDF is a pretty good interim solution, in this age when documents are still designed primarily for print, but you want to make an electronic version also available. Once a document is created for printing, it’s trivial to create a PDF version of it. It’s a lot more work to convert it to a structured HTML file or something similar.
That said, I still appreciate a warning on PDF links. Even on my fastest computers, opening a PDF can involve a few seconds extra delay. And since I don’t use browser plug-ins, a PDF link opens a new window, taking focus away from the browser. These are very minor nuisances, I admit, but I still appreciate a little heads-up before I click on the link.
If I have to enlarge the page, scroll it vertically AND horizontally, just to view some information that might not be critical to me…I’m not gonna do it. Design is nice, and I appreciate a nice design. But not when it interferes with the swift and easy intake of information. If the information is absolutely essential to me, I will hate the designer as I read, and swear under my breath.
By the way, some people have a positive hatred of some common fonts. I don’t particularly hate any clean font (I like the Olde Englishe type of fonts for appearance, but I don’t really want to read a lot of that sort of thing). However, just in the past couple of weeks people have expressed hatred of both Comic Sans and Papyrus on these boards.
Similarly, I won’t read comic books/graphic novels when the font is hard to read, when the lettering and background are not highly contrasted, or when the background is so cluttered with design that it’s hard to read.
Design is SECONDARY. Information is PRIMARY. When design interferes with information, design should just go sit in the corner and mumble to itself that it’s not properly appreciated. Design is NOT ESSENTIAL. By insisting on having your design shown exactly as you envision it, you are limiting your potential audience.
Oh, another thing I hate about pdfs. I can’t copy and paste just a section of information. I have to save the whole damn thing, even if I just want a paragraph or two.
In reply to your earlier post also - I will grant that forms have an interest in maintaining strict conformity. Conformity is the whole point of forms.
For all other documents though, I stand by my earlier statement. As a graphic designer and a web developer myself I think it’s off base to insist that accessibility is something that the graphic artist can dictate. It’s impossible for any one design to be perfectly readable to all possible. A better design embraces the possibility of flow and customization which digital texts provide.
And honestly, unless we’re talking about something like a tax form, straightforward html 4 or rtf will work just fine for any given document that’s intended to be read on the computer. The content doesn’t change whether you use a serif or san-serif font. (And the whole issue of not having a font could be solved by sticking with the standards: TNR & Arial or Helvetica & Georgia for the bodies & headers.) The content doesn’t change if the graphics wrap on the left or the right or appear centered. The content doesn’t change if you ignore page breaks in a medium that doesn’t have pages.
A document that will be sent to the printer has different requirements but any document (as opposed to something like a submission form) distributed digitally should be formatted with digital reading in mind. Pagination and strict artistic layouts belong to other types of media. I think this is true no matter what tool is used to create the doc.
As far as creating the documents, using Word or Pages isn’t significantly different from the perspective of the creator. Anyone who can make a PDF can make a Word document or an RTF file. Even a basic web page template in html4, with no fancy shmancy css or table layout, is more than sufficient for formatting a digital file. Keeping the layout straightforward makes things simple and faster for the creators as well as reducing the possibility of screwups on the users’ end.
Lynn, I admire the efficiency with which most Gamefaqs texts are created. The whole site “works” because the creators are diligent about careful text formatting. I’ve wondered if it would be possible to add a section for faqs with screenshots but they’re probably smart to keep the graphic maps and screenie separate altogether (like for example, the faqs for Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, where maps and such are clearly labeled GIF or JPG).
I absolutely hate pdf documents because of how they force you to look at them.
The reason why people warn about them are all the listed reasons already given. People used to warn about movie links too, because not everybody has high speed internet or can get it.
I used to think this, too, until last week. A student sent me a term paper in RTF format, as interpreted by Microsoft Word. TextEdit couldn’t open it at all, and when I looked at it from the command line, the first five pages were nothing but font specifications.
And the latest versions of word processors default to the latest file formats, and no one who has an older version can read them. Worse, there is usually no warning and the average user has no knowledge of compatibility problems.
However, PDFs aren’t immune to this. The lastest Acrobat can produce PDFs that the oldest Readers can’t handle, or cause an error message.
If you can’t copy and paste text, it’s because the PDF wasn’t created the best way, from source text, but scanned and made into a bitmap first. In all the documents I create, you can copy & paste text just fine.
For examples, go to this web site, scroll down halfway, and download any newsletter (none are larger than 1.5MB). You should be able to select and copy any text: http://www.doorbell.net/gda
Maybe in your experience, but not in mine, and others. Firefox + Acrobat = crash. That behavior can be changed by configuring Firefox to launch Acrobat as a separate app rather than in the browser, but it’s beyond me why Firefox or Adobe haven’t fixed it.
Another highly annoying thing about Acrobat Reader; if you have a PDF open while you’re shutting down Windows, the Shutdown will be aborted while Acrobat asks you if you’re sure you want to close the document. Of course I’m sure, it’s a read-only viewer, what could it possibly hurt to close a PDF? I’ve walked away from a shutting down computer several times only to come back later and see it stuck on that stupid error message.
Firefox is my default browser, and I do not have Acrobat set up to launch as a separate app. And again, I have yet to experience any problem opening PDF files. Could it be that the thing that needs fixing is not Firefox or Acrobat, but something else on your computer?
Also, a question for clarification - are we talking about PDF files in general, or specifically PDF files that are referenced as a link on a website?
PDF files that are referenced as a link on a website. If it just happened on my computer I wouldn’t have mentioned it, I’ve seen it in many places. Search Google, it happens to many people.
Fair enough, thanks for clarifying re: website. As for the other part, I still can’t help but wonder if there is some other configuration issue involved. My main reason for wondering is that I sure as hell don’t know how to tweak Firefox, Acrobat, or anything else in order to make sure everything works right, and although it is possible that I landed ass-backwards into the exact config that lets PDF files work correctly, I can’t help but feel that it’s unlikely.
Complaining about bloatware is pointless, but Adobe Reader 9 for Mac is 230 Megs. Last week I clicked on a .pdf, that demanded version 9 so I updated. But, I can’t imagine what it would be like trying that with dial-up.
And jeez, the version of Office I have on my machine is less than half that big. My Photoshop is smaller. Mutter.
Well, I learned something new today. After trying, and failing, to copy and paste bits of text from various pdfs, I quit trying. However, if I have a choice of two files to view, and one is pdf and the other one isn’t, I will STILL read the non-pdf one first.
The website is attractive, but I can’t read the newsletters without magnifying them, and then there’s the sidescroll issue again. Plus, since at least one newsletter page is in the two-column format, I have to scroll vertically to read one column, go back up, and then scroll down to read the next column. Frankly, if I was one of the targets for this information, I wouldn’t bother reading it. I’d read it in plain text, with a minimum of scrolling, but I would not really want the images with the text. Heck, I wouldn’t want information and pics about cats presented this way, and I am absolutely nuts about cats.
The cursor default in the files I looked at is set to grab and move the image. I had to look around on the toolbar to find the way to select text. I can’t seem to select images at all, if I wanted to save an image to my computer.
Nope, this is not what I want in an online newsletter. I would be happy to receive it in snailmail, as I could easily reference it, but what I want in an online reference is often quite different than what I want in a dead tree version. I used to work with the guy who put out a newsletter for a group I was active in, so I appreciate the hard work that goes into such things…but I want a different version online.
I dislike PDFs because you can’t quote from them. These days it’s a rare PDF that makes my computer crash, but it does happen occasionally, despite me constantly updating my reader.
Foxit looks like something worth trying - thanks for the recommendations.
Of course, if I were using a computer that’s not my own, like at work or at a net cafe or at a friend’s, then I wouldn’t be able to download extra stuff or mess around with settings.
But when you enlarge the font, you often have to scroll backwards, forwards, upwards, downwards, all over the place, and it’s pretty much unreadable.
Screen-readers - especially the ones that come with the computer - (for people with serious vision problems) tend not to work with PDFs. Part of the reason is that they don’t work with all fonts. That’s one very good reason for the warning - never assume that everyone out there has the same abilities as you.
