HTML versions of the Guides

Duh! I did that--while I was making my lunch today: downloaded the Writer UG PDF from the LO site, enabled it with Acrobat, and test ran it with Adobe Reader. Time spent: Less than ten minutes, including time for posting emails, cooking, eating, a phone call, etc.

My point is some LO personnel should put aside any biases with regard to restrictive tendencies to avoid using proprietary software and the like. I realize that open-source exclusivity is nearly akin to be like a religion, for a few...

Late in my work career, I spent a few years teaching at both public and private K-12 schools in metro Detroit. Many of the brighter, college-oriented kids would, on their own, employ their magic markers for highlighting items in their books or other printed documents, much the same that we did decades earlier--both at school and afterward. Highlighting is actually very common; otherwise firms would not sell billions of Sharpies and the like.

But now, PDF editing/reviewing functionality can be effortlessly imparted to any and all PDFs, once enabled by a simple, one-time conversion by Acrobat for use for anybody with the ubiquitous Adobe Reader afterward.

Gary

The number of PDFs in LO's library is very finite; plus, very few new PDFs are generated on a consistent basis. Converting them all could effortlessly be done in very short order.

Another thing that is really needed is accurate, well-written exposition for performing any Review and Comment (in this case, although that could also be done in other places), in addition to any other items that were not adequately covered (or, possibly covered in error...) in the existing user guides, to date.

For instance, I was redoing bits of the LO template. I altered the very first point--missing, in that case: for users of the templates to see to it that they already have the needed typeface (Liberation) installed so that its fonts are already installed before authoring or editing anything, lest the operating system might substitute another font for any missing font--thus altering the format in a manner that could be very difficult to detect. That point should have been made clear earlier, so I rewrote that part.

There are some other items that need redoing in the template. I will post what I have redone so far, so anybody could comment on my changes, make their own changes, among others.

Gary

Hi

I used LibO 3.3 to produce a PDF file on windows 7. Opening the PDF using Acrobat X on windows 7 and you are able to use both highlights and comments. The review parts also seem enabled.

Highlights and comments definitely save. It maybe that this is possible already without Acrobat Pro.

Regards

John

[applauds]

It's pretty after midnight local time here, so a last answer for
today...

> ... [Offering enhanced PDF Manuals]

> So finally, why don't you "just do it" yourself?

Duh! I did that--while I was making my lunch today: downloaded the
Writer UG PDF from the LO site, enabled it with Acrobat, and test ran
it with Adobe Reader. Time spent: Less than ten minutes, including
time for posting emails, cooking, eating, a phone call, etc.

No, I meant, why don't you offer the service yourself?

You did one conversion, ok - but for the service you need to
- explore legal issues
- set up a work flow
- "market" the enhanced version
- offer them on a appropriate website
- ensure at least as well es possible that the service will be continued
when you are ill, unwilling or whatever
...
(might be I'm overseeing parts, so pls bare with me)

So, there's much more work to do than to just prototypically show that
it's possible.

My point is some LO personnel should put aside any biases with regard
to restrictive tendencies to avoid using proprietary software and
the like. I realize that open-source exclusivity is nearly akin to
be like a religion, for a few...

But a major goal of Free + Open Source Software is to give people more
personal freedom. So why do you think they "should put aside biases" -
if they just "use" their freedom they are offered by FLOSS philosphy.
Here, they are allowed to use whatever tool they want, so - let them
enjoy doing so.

You might be right that indeed some people behave kind of rather
fundamentalistic. But - that's their choice. If you want them to behave
differently the only thing is to argue and "sell" them your ideas.

And indeed, that's what you are doing, so if nobody bites into the lure,
it might be the wrong moment, not enough persuasing arguments, the wrong
people, or I don't know what else.

Try again later?

Choose a different audience?

Do it yourself? (I mean the whole thing, not just showing that it works
in principle)

Late in my work career, I spent a few years teaching at both public
and private K-12 schools in metro Detroit. Many of the brighter,
college-oriented kids would, on their own, employ their magic
markers for highlighting items in their books or other printed
documents, much the same that we did decades earlier--both at school
and afterward. Highlighting is actually very common; otherwise firms
would not sell billions of Sharpies and the like.

Ok, so your experience predestinates you to speak in favor of offering
enhanced PDF, but still you have to persuade people here to follow your
argumentation.

But now, PDF editing/reviewing functionality can be effortlessly
imparted to any and all PDFs, once enabled by a simple, one-time
conversion by Acrobat for use for anybody with the ubiquitous Adobe
Reader afterward.

Yes, I see the point that it might be an - let's say - interesting
possibility.

But speaking fo myself personnaly, I'm contributing to this project here
just because I enjoy doing things I love and decide myself to do. So I
might have catched up with your idea and helping you to propagate it.

But alas, I haven't.

For whatever reason - I just haven't.

It's not attractive enough for me to put energy into it. Not even a
small amount (as testing the enhanced PDF).

This is absolutely not meant to offend you or to discredit your opinion
or intention - in no way.

But it is just not attractive enough for me to catch fire. At least not
at the moment.

And, obviously it did not attract many other people either.

Now (if you did not receive tens of private mails speaking in favor of
your idea) I'd say, well - did not work this time, with this audience,
with these arguments - so let's try later. Or a slightly different idea.
Or with new arguments. Or what else.

But it's up to you, how you decide. That's freedom :slight_smile:

Nino
definitely falling asleep in a few moments :wink:

You need not do anything for Commenting and Analysis as long as you are employing Acrobat Pro--any version going back to either 6 or 7.

However, in order to enable a vanilla PDF for other users employing Adobe Reader, open the desired PDF and go to the Comments menu (Comments > Enable for Commenting and Analysis in Adobe Reader--its new nomenclature). You will be prompted to overwrite the PDF or to employ Save as for creating a new PDF. That is all that is needed to convert the PDFs...

BTW, you too can easily convert the LO PDFs. So, now there are at least three of us who can. There are probably lots of others, too.

Gary

John,

Hi

I used LibO 3.3 to produce a PDF file on windows 7. Opening the PDF using
Acrobat X on windows 7 and you are able to use both highlights and comments.
The review parts also seem enabled.

Highlights and comments definitely save. It maybe that this is possible
already without Acrobat Pro.

Regards

John

From: Jean Hollis Weber
Sent: Thursday, June 23, 2011 10:08 PM
To: documentation@global.libreoffice.org
Subject: Re: [libreoffice-documentation] HTML versions of the Guides

> Having the Review and Comment functionality on a PDF (to be done with
> Adobe Reader) must be first imparted by Acrobat Pro to that file. Trust
> me...

Gary is correct on this point.

As for doing that, Gary states elsewhere that it's a quick and easy
process for anyone who has Acrobat Pro. That is also correct.

I would put this in the bucket of "if Gary (or some other member of the
team who already has Acrobat Pro) wants to do this step for each of our
PDFs, then let them do it" -- except for the following reservations:

* If someone starts doing this, users will have an expectation that all
the LO user guide PDFs will have this functionality.

* If only 1 or 2 people are doing this, it puts them on the critical
path for publishing PDFs that meet the expectations mentioned above and
could cause a bottleneck, especially if the person were unavailable for
any reason.

BTW, I have Acrobat Pro, but I am not offering to do what Gary suggests
because it is on a (Windows) machine that I rarely turn on, so setting
the Review and Comment switch on a PDF is a much more time-consuming
effort which I might do only once a week, if that often.

--Jean

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Did use any settings other than default ones when saved the pdf? If so,
please advise because this may be a good tip to tell people. If you can
produce a pdf file with virtually all the functionality a user would
need why would you use Adobe not save the money? I would use the less
expensive option that is available.

Saving a vanilla PDF with Acrobat Pro will not impart any Commenting and Analysis functionality until after that function is first enabled through the Comment menu in Acrobat Pro. Then, saving such an enabled PDF will make that PDF able to be commented, etc. on by a user with Adobe Reader.

Gary

We are essentially saying the same thing. For necessary files where the ODF cannot be read due to the inability of having LibreOffice installed to read ODF files then falling back on .pdf's is fine. If there is a need to create a quick and dirty ODF reader, then we should put this to the dev's as a project -- a "LibreOffice Reader". We should not be advocating the use of any other format unless we really have to. If our documents are so important for a user to want to read, then they should download our product to read our wonderful manuals.

I expect to see PDF readers on certain platforms long before I see an ODF reader (iPhone, Android, Kindle, etc), yet I may use those devices to read my documents when I am away from my computer.

Would love to have a copy of LO that works on my portable platforms, but I really do not expect it any time soon. Would be nice, however.... I would rate that as a much lower priority that some other issues in the software (like say a better macro recorder).

Otherwise, we relegate the ODF (and LibreOffice) to a secondary position -- there will always be individuals inside our group who will clamour for a .pdf version to add "universality" to our product line. This is completely counter-productive. The request for .pdf will never cease and all of our documentation will be in ODF/PDF versions with no real reason to fully adopt the ODF format by any user.

Well, off hand, I can download the ODF file, generate the PDF, but then I must move it through my computer before I move it on to the devices that do not support ODF. I need to also make certain that you provide all the fonts that I require and install those. I used to have that problem with PDFs generated by my employer. They used some strange font that my computer did not have. I had to install the font before I could view the document. Need to teach them how to embed the font into a PDF file.

Worse, corporate adoption of our product will be hard to get if they will never see the benefits of using our products if they only read it through .pdf formats for their convenience. It is difficult to issue accolades to a product that second guesses itself to its intended user base. If pdf's are so necessary, then people should be looking for a .pdf office suite as everyone extolls its virtues.

Most of the clients that I see, and even where I work, most of the users are not given sufficient permissions that they are able to install new software on their computers. In most cases, documents that I generate using ODF must be converted to another form for delivery. The only place you will likely have traction when you say "download this to look at my documents" is when you generate a document of sufficient interest that the average user is willing to do so.

I don't think Adobe would ever suggest to anyone else to use a different format for people to read their manuals, they would of course tell all to download their reader and to then read their wonderful manuals.

Easy to shoot holes in most of my concerns as they relates to say LO documentation, however, because the person who desires LO documentation likely has LO installed. So, acrobat documentation as a PDF makes sense. Better not use fonts that the user will not have, however. Consider that in Gnome 3 they removed the minimize button because the average user will be confused by it "where did my program go". Off hand, I would say that if that is true, then it is not reasonable to expect a user to install much of anything (I must be tired and cranky).

When I am using a computer that is not my own (say at work, at a library, visiting a neighbor or family) and I want to look up something in the documentation.... Asking to install a large piece of software is frequently not an option. I know people that still use dial-up.

We should do the same, as we do have the better format of the two. The use of .dpf's should be done in a very strategic way and not in a universally applied fashion.

All of my opinions.

Cheers

Marc

It is not possible to embed fonts in an ODF document, but I can in a PDF document. Then again, last time I tried to create a PDF/A-1a using LO, the generated PDF was not usable (it caused my PDF reader to crash). Last time I tried this with OOo, it worked fine.

LO has some bugs in this regard. Last couple of PDFA-1a that I tried crashed the reader every time.

Every generated PDF should probably be tested.

Andrew

> We are essentially saying the same thing. For necessary files where
> the ODF cannot be read due to the inability of having LibreOffice
> installed to read ODF files then falling back on .pdf's is fine. If
> there is a need to create a quick and dirty ODF reader, then we should
> put this to the dev's as a project -- a "LibreOffice Reader". We
> should not be advocating the use of any other format unless we really
> have to. If our documents are so important for a user to want to read,
> then they should download our product to read our wonderful manuals.

I expect to see PDF readers on certain platforms long before I see an
ODF reader (iPhone, Android, Kindle, etc), yet I may use those devices
to read my documents when I am away from my computer.

Would love to have a copy of LO that works on my portable platforms, but
I really do not expect it any time soon. Would be nice, however.... I
would rate that as a much lower priority that some other issues in the
software (like say a better macro recorder).

>
> Otherwise, we relegate the ODF (and LibreOffice) to a secondary
> position -- there will always be individuals inside our group who will
> clamour for a .pdf version to add "universality" to our product line.
> This is completely counter-productive. The request for .pdf will never
> cease and all of our documentation will be in ODF/PDF versions with no
> real reason to fully adopt the ODF format by any user.

Well, off hand, I can download the ODF file, generate the PDF, but then
I must move it through my computer before I move it on to the devices
that do not support ODF. I need to also make certain that you provide
all the fonts that I require and install those. I used to have that
problem with PDFs generated by my employer. They used some strange font
that my computer did not have. I had to install the font before I could
view the document. Need to teach them how to embed the font into a PDF
file.

I may be wrong, but I believe MSO 2010 and 2007? are able to open ODF files except for possibly Base

Hi :slight_smile:
MS Office 2007 & 2010 can open the older ODF format but tend to struggle a bit
with the newer one. I don't think Base forms and Reports are compatible but i
haven't tried it so i don't know. There is apparently an add-on to make MS
Office 2003 be able to read the old ODF format too but i don't know how stable
or what versions of MSO it works on.

Tools - Options - "Load/Save" - General
then about halfway up change the drop-downs default from
"1.2 Extended (recommended)"
to
"1.0/1.1"
Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

Hi :slight_smile:
It might be worth posting a bug-report
http://wiki.documentfoundation.org/BugReport
Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

I had heard (meaning way back when ever) that MS would support ODF before they supported their own proposed standard. I was reading ODF files in MSO even before that using the plug-in created by Sun (and then pulled by Oracle to become a for-pay product).

I only move simple ODF documents to Word because of issues with respect to things such as: Frames, Links, and Styles. For the most part, complex documents read into MSO is a one way trip. MSO and OOo do not have good compatibility for complex things. The simplest of examples is that OOo and LO rely on styles in a serious way. MSO has improved style support, but can't even begin to come close to the support provided by OOo.

So, when I create a complex document, if the deliverable is a PDF, I am likely to use OOo (historically, it has had much better PDF export capabilities). If the deliverable is a Word document, then I start with Word and stay in Word. I have worked for only one client that would accept an ODF document as a deliverable. Ironically, it was a requirement.

Thanks for the link. Very adept at filing OOo bug reports, never opened one against LO.

I only recently installed LO, and that was to test if they had integrated a bug fix that seriously affects me in OOo (it is fixed in OOo 3.3.1, but that has not been released, and the fix is in the latest full release of LO). On the other hand, LO introduced a new bug that also seriously affects me (DEL does not work in the IDE). I am told that the bug is already fixed in the latest release candidate. Would need to verify that the PDF bug is not already fixed in the latest release candidate first.

Feels like a pretty serious over site to not have already been discovered. I have theories as to why that might be....

Hi :slight_smile:
I think the devs are working through old OOo bug-reports but the LO space has
better functionality allowing extra categories such as "Easy Hack". So, even if
a bug-report has been filed again OOo it probably wouldn't hurt to file it
against LO and then maybe help the triagers by giving the Url address of the old
OOo one so that they can decide how to handle it.

Good luck and regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

Hi :slight_smile:
I think MSO 2007 and 2010 and possibly the plug-in or add-on or whatever too are
only able to handle the old 1.0/1,1 Open Document Formats. LibreOffice defaults
to using the more advanced 1.2 (Extended). Oddly it seems that text-boxes and
pictures don't get messed up when you re-save using the older format. I'm not
sure how much better the result looks in MSO tho. My boss got so annoyed at MSO
by that point that we are going to install LibreOffice on all the machines at
work :=))
Regards from
Tom :slight_smile:

Also, FYI, I have been monitoring the number of mails on the dev list. On most regular days, the devs post close to 100 mails per day. If you take a quick look at the dev mail exchanges, many of these are fixes or "working-towards-a-fix-soon" exchange of mails. This is an awesome rate of exchange of mail correspondence on a dev list.

If there is a known bug, the devs have a quick response to their fixes. Feeding the LibreOffice bugzilla is the best way to quash those bugs.

And, thanks to the devs for their amazing work!

Cheers

Marc

Dear Tom. You seem to be one of the headers of this group. I'm triyng to unsuscribe with the links above, but it's imposible. Have you any good idea to help me with this? I'm now collaborating with a diferente group of spanish documenters of the proyect and I need to stop the tsunami of emails coming from this group. thanks.

Hello Luis,

[...]

Dear Tom. You seem to be one of the headers of this group. I'm triyng to
unsuscribe with the links above, but it's imposible. Have you any good
idea to help me with this? I'm now collaborating with a diferente group
of spanish documenters of the proyect and I need to stop the tsunami of
emails coming from this group. thanks.

I'm not Tom, but I reply anyways. :slight_smile:

Did you send an email to documentation-unsubscribe@global.libreoffice.org? Did you also use the same address to send this message, that is subscribed to this list? You should have gotten a message asking you, if you really want to unsubscribe. (check your spam folder, if you haven't seen this message yet). Reply to this message. This means, open it to read, then hit the "reply" button within your email program and send the message. You don't need to add anything. You should get a "Good-bye" message and that will be the last thing you receive from this list.

May I ask with which group you're collaborating now? (I'm just curious).

Hope this helps.

Sigrid