Software Review: Adobe Acrobat X Pro

BANGALORE, INDIA: You feel the richness right from when you fire open Acrobat X Pro.The very first thing that you will like is the aesthetically pleasing and intuitive interface. With the very ancient looking and crowded toolbar and menu system of the older versions relooked at, what we have now is a very minimalist and non-obtrusive system in place.

You can now use the tool pane that appears on right hand side to easily access the function you are looking for thus leading to lesser time wasted and increase in productivity. However, we believe that there will be a lot more enhancements in UI on its way in the next few releases of the software.

Do a lot more with PDF

The latest version of Acrobat lets you do a lot more with a PDF than ever before. For starters, you can now select specific content within a PDF and simply right click to export it to a variety of file formats, such as docx, doc, xlsx, rtf, xml, html, and csv. We tried exporting an entire PDF to a Word document and tables from PDF to an Excel sheet, and the result was a perfectly exported file.

Next up is one of the innovative features in the list i.e. PDF portfolios. You can now throw in a variety of file types into a PDF i.e. documents, Excel sheets, pictures, videos, audio, web content, etc. Not just that, you can quickly apply the preset professionally designed layouts, visual themes, and color palettes.

With all these included, what you can produce is a very professional PDF portfolio to send out your customers, clients, suppliers, etc.

What does this translate to in layman's terms? No more sending of multiple attachments in an email where you have a note saying 'For cost breakup, refer to the attached Excel sheet. For an overview, see the screenshot above. What's more is that you can now include a video file to, let's say, give a formal presentation of the proposal, from within the PDF.

Acrobat X Pro supports seamless conversion of a variety of video formats into portfolios. However, with this new technology in play, it is crucial that the receiver has the latest Acrobat Reader installed on his computer.

{#PageBreak#}

Continuing with the productivity thrust of Acrobat X, the product has an Action Wizard in place. This will prove to be a big time saver, as you can now create, manage, execute and share a sequence of frequently used steps that can be applied to PDF files.

The preset actions available are Prepare PDF presentation, Publish Sensitive Documents, Archive Paper Documents, Create Accessible PDFs, Get Scan Doc from MFP, Prepare for Distribution, and Prepare for Review. These and your custom Action Wizard will also help in consistency or standard of the way PDF files are prepared across the organization.

Another key feature that is offered is the ability to create interactive forms. You can also use existing forms, be it from a scanned paper, an existing PDF document, a Word document or an Excel sheet, into fillable PDF forms with intelligent form field recognition. This will allow you to quickly collect data, manage responses, and export to spreadsheets for analysis.

Acrobat X also brings in a lot in terms of collaboration in working on PDFs. You can now enable working seamlessly with PDF files with the new integration with Microsoft SharePoint. The markup tools, commenting, annotations, etc can help you gather comments and inputs from multiple participants before you actually prepare the final document. Also, you are enabled with the function to permanently remove information before publishing or sharing a sensitive document. Basically, working with co-workers, partners, suppliers or customers, just got a lot easier with this product.

Along with this product, there are couple of new services at offer on Acrobat.com viz. Adobe SendNow and Adobe CreatePDF. You might want to give a shot to Adobe SendNow which enables users to send and receive large files. This product has a lot to offer in the pricing it comes for.

Bottomline: Adobe has taken professional PDF communications to a whole new level with Acrobat X.