Well, at last, here I can give information rather than just
receive it!
Like yourselves, I'm rather ticked off that Adobe is not
developing DOS readers to keep up with the newer PDF
formats. The main issue is not really the comparitive poverty
of legacy PC users--after all, the idea of PDF format is
that it can be read and printed by anyone, using the free
Acrobat Reader software. It's more a question of the time
and labour needed to update the DOS reader, which is seen
as a relatively unproductive activity, and of the increasing
"featuritis" of the Adobe software producing PDF files. The
more fancy stuff PDFs include, the larger and more complex
the PDF files themselves and the software needed to read
them properly. At a certain point, it simply becomes
impossible to get the Reader to run on a "survivor" 386
with mono EGA.
I use Adobe Acrobat Exchange 1.0 on my Mac (which won't
accommodate the later versions, for the same reason--
mono display, slow CPU, too little RAM) to produce PDFs
which can be read with the old DOS reader. But the newer
Exchange, Distiller, Capture, etc. produce files which
have a lot of strange proprietary codes and stuff and use
some kind of internal compression system to keep the
file size within bounds (sorta) which may not be easy
to accommodate on a DOS box.
As for the reasons why people may prefer to post their
information in PDF format, these are the main ones:
1) As a society, we've got so that people are more
concerned with presentation than substance --a very
bad reason, but pretty common.
2) Most people don't know what "text" is, amazingly
enough--they know about Word and WordPerfect,
their own e-mail program and maybe have heard that
Web pages are in HTML but they are not at all familiar
with file conversions, text editors and such. (I am
constantly having to explain to clients and fellow-editors
how to get a wordprocessor to save a text file which can
be pasted into e-mail, for example, and even most
technical writers these days don't know how to use
non-Microsludge products.) They want a platform-
independent format and ask a techie/DTP person, who
immediately thinks PDF. --a semi-good reason.
3) Finally, there is a VERY good reason for putting
certain kinds of information up as PDFs rather than
text--it means that the information will be printed and
circulated intact, since most people would have no idea
how to alter the contents of a PDF file. Text can be changed
very easily by practically anyone who feels like it, which
makes it very insecure against tampering. I suspect this
is behind governments' preference for PDF documents
(rather than the wordprocessor attachments some government
employees seem unable to convert to text even with
instructions!) when it is a matter of controlling the
accuracy of legal texts, regulations, and even simple
documents which might give rise to legal disputes.
It would be really nice if there were a non-proprietary
format allowing people to "lock down" the contents of
sensitive documents in plain text, but I don't think there
is one. Meanwhile, as usual, the people who can't afford
the fancier tools and equipment often find they can no
longer request a printed copy of the documents--which
the department responsible could easily print as needed
from the existing PDF.
Such is life, alas.
Regards,
Judyth
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