As you are probably aware, the strength of the Portable Document Format is that is creates a document that can be read and from which (in most cases) content can be copied from, while the content itself remains unchangeable. Advantages of Using a PDF PrinterĬreating a PDF is a different matter to reading one. Any PDF document that you have at hand should then open, and if you don’t have any saved on your computer you should be able to find something suitable to read online. You will need to enter your password to authenticate the installation, but a few seconds later you should have a PDF reader app running on Ubuntu. In the search results, select the item you wish to download and either view More Info (useful for seeing a screenshot and any reviews) or go straight to Install (this option is also available from More Info). To get either or both of these tools, go to Applications > Ubuntu Software Center and search for either “adobe” or “pdf”. This and the other recommended choice, Evince Document Viewer, are both available for a quick and easy install via the Ubuntu Software Center (seen here running in Ubuntu 11.04, Natty Narwhal). There are many community-developed PDF reading tools for Ubuntu, as well as the standard Adobe Reader 9, which you would expect to find. Finding and Installing a PDF Reader in Ubuntu All Ubuntu users should have access to a good quality PDF reader, whether for reading instruction manuals or e-books and web comics. However, we won’t ignore the requirement to read PDFs either, as they have become such an important element of computing. We’re going to take a look at how you might setup an Adobe PDF printer in Ubuntu, enabling you to create (or “distil”) your own portable documents that you can then share with friends, colleagues or even customers.

Ever since its original launch in 1999, the popularity of the PDF format as a method of creating and viewing portable documents has become so great that it is now the de facto reading format across all manner of platforms, from desktops to tablets to mobile phones and even media centers and web-connected TVs.Īs you might have guessed, you can read and create Adobe documents in Ubuntu, although the software used for this isn’t available by default.

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