I believe accepting an “option” should always require having to manually check a box.īottom line: If you plan to download ANY software from ANY website on the Internet, be sure to read everything on the download page before clicking the Download or Install Now button.īonus tip #1: If you want to ensure that all of your downloads are free of shady “optional offers”, download them from OlderGeeks!īonus tip #2: Want to make sure you never miss one of my tips? Click here to join my Rick’s Tech Tips Facebook Group. However, in my opinion it’s a bad practice (that borders on deception) to have the “opt-in boxes” checked by default. These “optional offers” are put there because the companies behind those programs pay Adobe to help them distribute their software in this manner. In fairness to Adobe, this method of distributing additional software is widely used by companies in the software industry. If the user fails to notice the “offers” for the add-on programs and simply clicks the Install Now button, the extra software will be installed right along with Adobe Acrobat Reader by default. That means if you click the “Install Now” button you’ll actually end up installing THREE new programs instead of one – with a new browser extension thrown in for good measure! And of course all three boxes are checked by default. Well, I recently received a message from a reader complaining about Adobe’s habit of bundling add-on programs with the downloads on their own site and I thought I should probably post a warning about it.Īn example of what the reader was complaining about is on the Adobe Acrobat Reader download page.Īs you can see in the screenshot below, it includes “optional offers” for not one, but THREE pieces of add-on software. Of course you can usually “opt out” of downloading the extra software by unchecking a box or two, but it’s very irritating that those boxes are typically checked by default. Lighter, simpler tools are available, but Adobe's free reader remains the one to beat.I’ve written many times about the habit of some free software download sites bundling unwanted “add-on” software with their downloads. Clicking Tools toggles open the online extras.Īs we noted, Adobe Reader X is the standard for freeware PDF readers, none of which can match Reader's capabilities and extras. The optional online services include converting PDFs to Word or Excel documents and creating PDFs using Adobe CreatePDF online. Reader doesn't lack support, either, starting with the sort of extensive Help file you'd expect from an Adobe product. Under the Edit menu, entries labeled Protection, Analysis, and Accessibility let us manage security settings, check document accessibility, and analyze data using the Object Data Tool and Geospatial Location Tool. A Tracker tool monitors updates to Reviews and Forms. Reader has some extras that stripped-down competitors can't match, such as its Read Out Loud tool, which can read documents to you if you have sound capability. We could highlight text, add Sticky Notes, take a Snapshot, and attach Comments. We could also Print our document or e-mail it as an attachment or via Adobe SendNow. Clicking the Sign icon on Reader's toolbar let us digitally sign documents by adding text or attaching a signature via a wizard. Reader rendered each document with high detail and faithful color reproduction. We clicked Open and browsed to a folder full of PDFs we use for testing. Reader X's familiar interface opens with a quick-start file manager from which we could open a recent file or log in to an existing Adobe Online account. With it you can view and annotate all PDF files, sign documents electronically, and access optional Adobe Online subscription services directly from inside its interface. We looked at the latest version of Reader, Adobe Reader X. Despite competition from simpler tools, Reader remains the standard the others are judged against. To open, view, and edit PDFs, you need a PDF reader - for example, Adobe's free Reader. PDF, the file format that carries the business world on its back, is everywhere, from product manuals to legal documents. Adobe developed the Portable Document Format to standardize electronic document handling.
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