Boy oh boy. Topics like this sure bring out the emotional side of us geeks. Too bad it usually suppresses the logical side of us. The basic facts are this:

Adobe owns the PDF format standard. Always has. It's proprietry, not "open". You have to obtain a license from Adobe to use their standard within your products. Apple, OpenOffice, and countless others have obtained legal licensing to do just that. Microsoft did not.

Microsoft was engaged in discussions with Adobe at the time they chose to incorporate the PDF output feature in Office 2007 Beta. Adobe had not granted the license to MS at that point. Then MS decides to pull a PR move and start accusing Adobe of threatening a law suit, and making it very public. Adobe only said it was a possible response if MS couldn't settle terms prior to official release.

That's it. Nothing more.

While it would be nice to have support for editing PDF files, writing them is easy.

Here is one: PDF Creator
http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator/

The nation's 4th largest insurance company has tested this and is about to roll it out to thousands of agents as its official pdf application...open source and all.

Other than the editing funtionality, there really is no issue here, other than MS getting caught with their hand in the cookie jar...ignoring licensing agreements.

"hand in the cookie jar"? Do you even know what you're talking about? Is OpenOffice's "hand" in the cookie jar too, then? Apple's? No? Just Microsoft then. Pedant.

OpenOffice.org and Apple both have standing license agreements with Adobe over the use of PDF creation features. Microsoft does not.

Word Perfect has a publish to pdf option without having a third party software like Acrobat. Why can't MS Office do the samething?

Are you actually reading the articles, or just making stuff up as you go along?

MS Office *DID* do this, but Adobe, wants a cut of the license in the process. Word Perfect has a publish to PDF option, because they PAID Adobe for the rights. MS tried to pay for the rights, but Adobe, rejected their offer, and they got greedy.

You STILL have to have a license for PDF, Adobe won't let you use it for FREE. Its NOT Open contrary to other users in this forum that believe so. PDF is the SOLE proprietary right of Adobe, its THEIR format.

"PDF is the SOLE proprietary right of Adobe, its THEIR format."

Try rationalising this with the statements following the Mass. row over open formats. Adobe's PR machine has spent months putting fears *just like this one* to rest.

Of course - Adobe's issue is Microsoft. You and I are clearly smart enough to see that this is the difference between the inclusion of PDF output in Office 2007 and OpenOffice.

However, Adobe is establishing a precedent that goverments might find troublesome - say they have adopted a particular technology platform on a large scale and Adobe throws another tantrum about PDF inclusion. Public bodies are going to wonder how "open" this format really is.

Don't wait for MS to give you PDF creation. Get http://www.primopdf.com/ . It installs as a printers so you can create PDFs from most windows applications. I've been using it for a while now and and it works fine.

cheers

Malcolm
www.laptopeasel.co.uk

People, the add-on is going to be free. Yes, Star Office and Open Office can save to PDF but who wants to install those in addition if you already have MS Office? Isn't PDF touted as a so called "Open Standard"? At least by the City of Massachusetts and Adobe it is, or is that just when every other Office Suite wants to implement it and not Microsoft's? Adobe Acrobat is way too pricey for what can be done with it. Remember that consumers are going to be offered the same pricing for Office 2007 as what academics are.

It will save me time and money being able to save my MS Office documents to PDF within one package and not having to install additional software to produce PDF's on multiple computers in our company.

We are seeing nothing but the microsoft FUD campaign here, seemingly trying to undermine PDF.

As far as industry groups coming out in support of microsoft. According to sourcewatch. ACT is a microsoft front group that masquerades as independant:

http://www.sourcewatch.o...dex.php?title=DCI_Group
“But Microsoft has also created new trade groups, the Association for Competitive Technology (ACT) and Americans for Technology Leadership (ATL), to generate support for the company through Web sites and a sophisticated and largely hidden grassroots lobbying campaign.”

Alarm Bells should go off that MS is starting a campaign before Adobe does anything. Likely Microsoft want to violate the license and follow it's embrace, extend and co-opt model to make open standards it's own.

I use OpenOffice which does have that feature built-in. It wouldn't matter though, PDF conversion freeware is everywhere.

While I do most of my work in Office I use OpenOffice to save these documents as PDF files as and when required.

Office is grossly overpriced as it is (as is Adobe Acrobat). We certainly don't want to have to pay more for the save to pdf option.

Perhaps Microsoft should sue Adobe for anti-competitive behaviour....

Today's software costs to much now.People getting minimum wage clearly can't afford these. If Microsoft has a PDF feature,they should be able to offer it free.

They were offering it for free for Office 2007.

I was wondering if this is just a case of M$ not wanting to pay Adobe for the rights to have there products pay nice with each other.
Or is it that Mr. gates wants Adobe to M$. Like Mr. Gates don't have enough $$$$$$$$$$$ !

Perhaps you missed the other news. But it is entirely Adobe's fault (from the consumer's perspective). Adobe has been allowing other companies to incorporate the save as PDF feature into their software. But they won't allow MS to do so because MS Office holds the majority of the marketshare.

Thats a good point.

No. Wrong. Adobe has granted licenses to others to legally incorporate PDF features in their products. Microsoft did not obtain such a license prior to incorporating within Office 2007 Beta. That was a stupid mistake on MS's part. Their $$$ legal team should have known better.

If I'm NOT able to save PDF files in the new MS Office suite, and Vista. Then to me that is a real reason NOT to buy both. I was looking to buy BOTH, but unless this is resolved.
The answer is simple. I won't and can't, because I must save PDF files in my business.

Thanks G. Ebert, Sr.

There are quite a few free software that allows you to do so from MS Office or any Windows application. :)

LOL you will not buy BOTH products simply because you can't save to PDF?? THat's hilarious...if the only feature you want out of both those products is saving to PDF you shouldn't buy either anyway. :)

There are MANY free products that will do that for you now, and that's not changing...so I just don't understand that line of thinking you have going there. :)

Its also a pathetic reason. lol

Yeah, I would have to agree, just because the integrated support is gone, you have to BUY a license for it work as it stands NOW anyway. So if you BUY both, it will STILL work.

I don't understand why this would have ANY affeect. That's just stupid reasoning.

If you BUY Acrobat, and you BUY office, then the support is there, its not going to stop it. Did you even read the article?

PDF support would have really added something to Office 2007. To bad.

It still is offered: "Microsoft says it will make the feature available through a downloadable add-on."

Adibe is treading on thin ice with this one, but I don't recall Microsoft ever backing down from something that they want to push (Metro) all that often either...Sure they did for Windows XP N, but that was a strategic decision; knowing that the market vendors wouldn't want it. Seems like MS is finally learning how to play the game! It may be safer for them to be a bit less obvious for next time though...

Everyone seems to skip over what the root cause of the problem is - Microsoft's improper licensing of the Adobe technology and the conditions it wants to attach to the use of Adobe's software.

MS would have enveloped the Adobe installation with it's own highly restrictive licence which is averse to conditions and intentions of the existing Adobe licence.

What you would also end up with PDFs that were not based on the the PDF standards and export tools that generated non-compliant PDFs. End result is Office PDFs that dont follow the open PDF standard.

The unwillingess of folks to read thru the FUD shows that the user community that has not recognised the similarities between this the Java episode.

MS's intentions are probably two fold - split the Adobe market up and fracture the strangle-hold the PDF format has on portable document distribution.

note: Brian Jone's blog is MS-sanctioned marketing... quoting his words is akin to free advertising for MS.

This looks like the most likely scenario. Microsoft has a history of trying to acquire rights to a certain technology that has grown enormously popular (where they don't have a significant presence), and then introducing their own versions that are not consistent with existing standards.
They would probably in the meantime introduce their own version of a file format like the Microsoft document imaging format that they have introduced in the latest version of MS office and build the reader into their OS.
Fragmenting an existing technology is the only way they can oust somebody else's technology from the marketplace, if they cannot just buy it out.

You're joking right? If I don't know better this sounds like more religous posturing of an anti-microsoft bigget.

Standards are just that standards. If Microsoft impliments something different then the PDF standard then it's not "standard", it isn't infringement and the claims then are baseless. Besides if there was a real issue with a disagreement over Microsoft not following the open standard then why did Adobe respond by asking Microsoft to charge for it? I would think they would have responded by asking Microsoft to follow the approved open standard.

if it doesn't conform to the PDF standard, they can't call it PDF. plain and simple.

Microsoft lost the Java case and they will lose this case.

And we only have Microsoft's word that Adobe asked them to charge for it. Adobe has yet to respond.

You are so right. XML anyone, open document format, java, html? the list goes on.

This is their track record. They started this back with DRDos and have never stopped. They make their own version, leverage their strenth to put a wedge in the competition's "standard". Pretty soon if you want to be compatible you have to buy the Microsoft one.

Don't get me wrong, I am all for competition, innovation and the like, but MS does play dirty sometimes. They know how to win and will stop at nothing.

There is nothing wrong with competing, but when they deliberately violate licensing agreements (java) in order to hurt a competitor they are putting money over ethics. They are no better than Enron at that point.

Dude, its Adobe's product. There is no "open" PDF standard. Adobe controls it, Microsoft wanted to use, and they couldn't agree on the PRICE of the license.

That's it.

Using PDF in Microsoft Office, was STILL the SAME product. It doesnt' change, its not even different. This is strictly a license issue. That's ALL this is.

And they Didn't lose the Java case, you idiot, that was fixed. XP SP1, didn't have JAVA, but SP2 did, because SUN and Microsoft mended their license problem. JAVA is 100% licensed by Sun to use in Microsoft Products.

We don't have ANY word, Microsoft didn't pay Adobe for the right to license the product. Adobe doesn't have to respond, their lawsuit pretty much says it all.

True indeed. However, if I were MS, I would turn the table and require Adobe pay a royalty fee to read (let alone add plug-ins within) MS-Office documents. Both are proprietary formats.

Regardless of all the pro/anti MS rhetoric, one thing remains true at all times: NOBODY forces anyone to buy anything. You are free to use any product you are willing to properly acquire. For almost everything MS makes there are alternatives. All this whining about how they play unfair is dumb. If you use MS products you're supporting it.

Actually that´s a shame! Corel, openoffice and many others have incorporated pdf for ages... And now that Microsoft is doing that... Anyway, Microsoft Office 2007 is GREAT! Goodbye Corel, openoffice and all other clones...

Adobe sucks for many reasons.

1) Adobe buys Macromedia out. **** that. Macromedia was a great company and I curse the day that the company caved in to the greedy Adobe company.

2) Adobe forces people to download their stupid "Download Manager" just to download something basic like the PDF reader ... and THEN when you install the thing, it tries to install it's other crap like "Photoshop Photo Studio" onto your computer as well.

3) Adobe's price of Photoshop is bulls*** ... almost forcing even respectable people to download a pirated version.

4) The incident being talked about right now. Adobe is playing favorites ... very unprofessional.

Four reasons why Adboe sucks.

Although I'm not usually a fan of any even-numbered product release, the purchase of Macromedia by Adobe is exactly why I upgraded to Dreamweaver 8.0. I figure it could possibly be the last decent release of Dreamweaver, since I'm sure Adobe will screw it up somehow.

Its sad, isnt it? Im sure theyll do something that will screw it up.

Exactly. Nicely said.

Funny. That's the same thing I did/said with InstallShield before Macrovision acquired them. I friggin hate Macrovision almost as much as Adobe. Next in line would be Oracle and SAP. I really don't care much about MS. I use there stuff at work, but not at home. It's actually getting harder to find a respectable company in the software industry any more. They all seem to be chasing the revenue with no regard for customer "care".

if you feel forced to download adobe's download manager to get acrobat reader, you might want to check your literacy skills. the link to download it directly is right there in plain english.

I use this:
eDocPrinter PDF Pro
http://www.iteksoft.com

Works like a printer driver, so you can export from virtually anything.

Yeah, it's exactly the same as CutePDF and countless other alternatives.

This is purely an effort by Adobe to be greedy and prevent Microsoft from actually challenging Adobe to make better products.

The problem with this is politics. It has very little to do with technology or pure legal matters. MS could indeed assert a legal right to continue on the course they started with PDF. I've read the standards, the license agreements, and researched how MS implemented it in Office 2007 and Vista. Nothing is wrong on that end. It's all a matter of Adobe getting paranoid that if Office can crank out PDF without Acrobat Professional, their one major source of revenue (aside from the victimization of Macromedia) will dry up. Given that Mass. and EU *HATE* Microsoft, it provides some leverage to Adobe when it comes to threatening legal action in one or both of those jurisdictions. It's stupid.

Think about Mass. and its open-doc man. They told you that pdf is open document format. Now it seems that either they are liar or they are stupid.

Adobe will let any one (Apple and all the third party software) export a document to pdf. The problem is that M$ wants to put the ability to "open and change content of an existing pdf" into their Open Office XML formats, effectively killing Acrobat Elements and Professional sales to Windows users. Apple users have to buy Acrobat software to do that... it's NOT built-in to OSX. Adobe has the right to protect it's sales!!!

M$ is the bad guy here not Adobe!!!

That's not true (unless there have been all-of-a-sudden feature additions going on). All Office 2k7 has is export to PDF. When you install Acrobat Pro, you get this same functionality via an Adobe supplied VBA macro that calls Distiller automagically.

This PDF functionnality also has nothing, *at* *all*, to do with the new Open XML MS Office formats.

MS Office (pre 2007) users can get PDF export for free anyway via ghostscript and PDFCreator.
http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator/

There's some serious posturing going on here

You must see this from Adobe's point of view. Microsoft Office holds the dominant share of the market. Most people who buy Acrobat use it to convert Office files. Native support by Office would mean very few will keep buying Acrobat. This means Acrobat and the PDF department will no longer be profitable for Adobe.

At the same time, Adobe did pledge to an open standard. Products like OpenOffice and PDFcreator increases PDF usage in a crowd that doesn't usually buy Acrobat anyways (the tech-savy, the cheap, the haters of M$ / Adobe). However, increased PDF usage and market share ultimately results in more Acrobat buyers.

Why should Adobe be forced to give Microsoft a free lunch at the loss of its own profits? A bankrupt Acrobat would mean the loss of the Adobe PDF development, and this affects us all. Since most people here get free PDF conversion one way or another, why are we b****ing about Adobe's right to survive?

Of course Microsoft will continue this PR campaign if it results in user opinion like this and the chance of getting PDF support for free! The right choice here is to submit to Adobe, since PDF support will increase sales anyways. Adobe would just get the same money from Microsoft it used to get from Acrobat.

The only problem Microsoft has is they have way too much CASH. Everyone on the street want a piece of it. They can easily buy out their "competition" such as Yahoo with an all cash deal.

The headline should have been, "Bloatware Drops Support For Bloatware"

Adobe used to be an excellent small creative software company that helped map the uncharted digital New World , two decades or so ago. These days, Adobe Inc is on my list of Corporate Robber Barons , right up there with Enron , Exxon , Wal-mart, the credit card hegemony, et al . Adobe's legal department has totally eclipsed its software engineering manifest and the net result is the user community is being oppressed and exploited .

I am no fan of Microsoft. Far from it, as a loyal Mac user since the early 1990's. But in this instance I side with Microsoft fully... Adobe's duplicity on the PDF fracas is disgusting. I really REALLY wish I didn't have to use any Adobe products whatsoever , just like I tried not to use any Microsoft stuff.

Adobe started to lose my respect many years ago when their sales and legal divisions got too greedy. This PDF dispute seals the indictment. The grand jury called the user community has so spoken. Abobe should allow ---no , be forced to allow--- standard PDF read/write to become public domain. Those who want enhanced or 3D Acrobat can purchase up.

Until Adobe comments, I see their position as anti-open. While OpenOffice (all platforms, including Windows) can export to PDF (oh, by the by, OpenOffice is free for non-profits, individuals, and other non-business users), and OS X has been able to do so for years, Microsoft Office for Windows is forced to *charge* for it? This is *despite* Microsoft Office being the most expensive (as well as being the most popular) productivity suite. Does Adobe sell *that* many copies of Acrobat Professional for Windows?
Contrast this with Microsoft's own behavior; not only has it subitted the Office Open XML formats to ECMA, but it has actually given *everybody* (including both Corel and Adobe), royalty-free usage of said formats.
This is the *same* Adobe that has championed the adoption of PDF as a document intrchange standard for darn near everything (for the last three years, I've used three different brands of tax-prep software; they *all* support exporting of the completed product to PDF). Is it one rule for everybody else, and another rule for Microsoft?
As far as Microsoft's conduct, they are actually taking the high road here, by allowing no-quibble usage of their own formats (even by Adobe). The ball is in Adobe's court.

Open for some, not for others.

Yeah. Adobe likes to play games now, eh?

Fine by me. We can stop using them. :)

Gee, that was easy.

you're going to stop using them over morals and ethics?
you don't even know the whole story
doesn't seem like you :-p
you are right though, seems they can't make up their minds
but then again, maybe Adobe has good reason to pull their format back
i don't care for Adobe as a company, but their products still come in handy

Adobe, another one of those companies I thought was half way desent but turned out to be wrong yet again.

At face value, Adobe is in the wrong here.

They need to sue everyone using PDF if they sue Microsoft.

Yeah, but Microsoft is the only real challenge to Adobe that could force them to work harder on bettering their products. Adobe has become complacent as the top dog in graphics and web publishing, and they don't work very hard at it... their products have become fat and happy cash cows no different than Office has been in recent years.

Go Microsoft!!! Office 2007 is GREAT. Once it´s final version is released, competition is doomed!!!!

Never used it, though the Office 2003 Pro is fantastic as well.

Right On!

Office 2007 will change the way you look at any previous office suites.

Well that is saying alot, because Office 2003 Pro is awesome. It blows me away that such a huge install is so rock solid and does not even require a reboot after installation. I'll have to check out 2007 one of these days when time permits.

just so you know
reboots are usually only necessary for changes in windows drivers

Most software such as antivirus, firewall and system maintenance utilities require a reboot after they are installed, at least on my computers they do. Whether or not they are changing drivers, I don't know and it doesn't really matter to me as long as the installs don't cripple my machines :) I'm just impressed that a huge office suite such as MS' offering requires no reboot after it's installed. I don't know about anyone else, but I've never encountered stability issues with it either. Some might say it has become bloated which may be true, but it seems, nevertheless, to work flawlessly. If you imply that MS Office does not change Windows drivers, I'll take your word for it.

Yah, Office 2007 will just blow you away again. Its looking really nice.

why would you group an office suite in with "antivirus, firewall, and system naintenance utilities"?

Did I group them in with an office suite? i don't think so. I only stated a fact; some software installs require reboots, while others don't.

As to the rights of adobe, I think adobe has the right to sue and complain about their possible lost of business. After all they made possible for the rest of us to have the adobe viewer free over some years now. That is an open service to the public all over the world. To make such a feature as one of the main attractions in incoming 2007 office does surely gives the right to adobe to sue as adobe viewers are part of the free service in government and other places. Adobe surely has the right to sue microsoft for lost of business.

That isn't the issue. Adobe's Reader software isn't even CLOSE to being the issue. The issue is conversion of Office file formats to PDF. Microsoft wanted to include a converter; Adobe wants Microsoft to charge for it (with some or all of that fee going to Adobe). *Never mind* that there are all sorts of free PDF conversion utilities out there (Adobe has taken no action against these products, which presumably violate one of more patents held by Adobe) and never mind that, with the exception of Corel WordPerfect Office, other productivity suites (including the free OpenOffice) include PDF as a document format option. You are basically giving Adobe a free pass for committing the same sort of *foul* that would be inexcusable if Microsoft were to do so. And here's the utterly laughable part: Microsoft, the victim in this case, is actually taking the high road and giving the competition (including Adobe) royalty-free access to Microsoft's Office Open XML formats!
Is Adobe *that* unconcerned over pissing off their customers?

Nothing in the incoming Ms Office suite 2007 is any better than what I have already got. Office 2003 and the latest Open Office suite if I require to convert any document into pdf well is very simple, and by the way faster that adobe acrobat, I transfer the document to open office and convert the file is quite simple I have the best of both worlds to which the incoming office 2007 will not be able to replace or improve. Good luck to you if your wish to spend money in office 2007 I will use that money to make improvements in my hardware instead.

Please remove your uneducated arse out of this discussion.

Office 2007 currently has a "PDF" printer/converter which allows a Save-As-PDF option in-line with the GUI (and it also has a Save-As-XPS option).

Your comments do not pertain to the discussion.

First off, most of the crap that spilled out of

your mouth and fingers was off topic to this

discussion. I dont know why some people cant

figure this out but OpenOffice only has about

10 percent of the features of Microsoft Office.

Its so funny how you think nothing in MS

Office 2007 has improved, yet so much has.

Yes, but those are the features that Adobe wants Microsoft to remove from the final release of Office 2007.

I can see where Adobe would be concerned - one of the big features for Adobe Acrobat is its integration with Office to generate PDFs, and this would knock out "Acrobat Elements", at least for Office users.

But the thing is that Office for Mac (with built-in PDF export via Mac OS X's Quartz) and Acrobat Standard have operated side-by-side (with varying degrees of bugfix-edness mind you) for years.

It does seem very strange. Either it's just a very weird thing for Adobe to do, or there must be more to the story than either of the pair are saying/admitting.

And, BTW, how exactly have Apple been "a55holes"? And whatever beef you've got, what on earth does that have to do with this story?

Adobe can't have it both ways. Either PDF is an open standard or it's not.

With all the free addons for office that allow you to save a file to the PDF format I don't understand why Adobe is making such a fuss.

For once I'm on Microsoft's side on this arguement.

Im with Microsoft 100 percent on this.

same.

Good, Im glad. :p

Brian Jones, the program manager for MS Office, gives his side of the story here on his blog:

...Adobe wanted us to charge our customers extra for the Save as PDF capability, which we just aren't willing to do (especially given that other companies already offer it for free). In order to work around this, it looks like we're going to offer it as a free download instead. At least that way it's still free for Office users, but unfortunately now there is an added hassle in that anyone that wants the functionality is going to have to download it separately.

This really is one of those cases where you just have to shake your head. Adobe got a lot of goodwill with customers, particularly in government circles, for making PDF available as an open standard. It’s amazing that they would go back on the openness pledge. Unfortunately, the really big losers here are the customers who now have one extra hassle when they deploy Office.

This is also surprising to me given that certain governments have viewed PDF as being more open than Open XML, yet Open XML is now proceeding through Ecma and there is a clear commitment from Microsoft that it will not sue anyone for using the formats. Anyone can build support for our formats, and we've already seen people starting to do this today (a couple weeks ago I actually referred to a demo we saw from the Novell folks where they had a prototype of a product using the Office Open XML formats). I don't think this was the intention, but Adobe seems to be saying that PDF is actually not open (or that it is open for some, but not for others). I'm not sure that any of those government policy makes could justify this outcome.

Hopefully Adobe will decide that this is a mistake and that they probably shouldn't try to sue people for using an open file format. If you're like me and think this is just a bad thing all around, you should let them know.

I think Adobe charging windows users extra to export PDFs is a GOOD THING.

By doing so it prevents Microsoft from profitting off of Adobe's Open Generosity. It also promotes Windows user's use of Open Source Competitive Applications such as Open Office, which by the way can save Windows Users several hundred dollars per seat in a corporate environmnet (Current Retail Price is $499 per License) In a small company with 100 desktops that translates to a savings of $49,900 simply by using Open Office instead of Microsoft Office.

So..in the overall scheme of things...Me thinks Microsoft does protest too much!

YOU GO ADOBE!

Adobe is charging *only Microsoft*, not Windows users as a class or group. Notice that OpenOffice (which is also available for Windows) still includes Save as PDF (OpenOffice for Windows is *free*, by the by). Tax preparation software for the *past three years* has also included Save as PDF (and not just the big boys such as TurboTax and TaxCut; TaxAct and TaxSlayer, both of which are often given away, support Save as PDF). There are *plenty* of no-cost PDF conversion utilities out there (especially for Windows); you can do a search for such right on FileForum and come up with several pages of them. And may I point out that most are, in fact, free? So it seems that Adobe is simply discriminating against Microsoft as a company.

We get office for about 250-300/seat...now for 200 users that's would be about about $60k...for a company that's chump change...and once you have those licenses each additional one is ~$300...not going to make any company go bankrupt. Much cheaper then retraining all employees to use a new office product....and most users are just much more comfortable with office, not to mention there are MANY more products out there that work with MS office...OpenOffice to a company is just not as atractive as you think.

The only people who think open office is attractive to a company is the admin that hates MS...

"I think Adobe charging windows users extra to export PDFs is a GOOD THING."

Ok, so that means that open office should remove the feature along with all the other office programs out there to right?

YOUR A FOOL

CDN $32.95, including shipping for the office Pro 2003 through my employer - for the full version, not dummied down in any way. It's governed by the Home-Use EULA, where one can use it as long as they are employed by the organization that has the MS Volume license agreement. It is a very sweet deal.

OK. Open source would mean it is open to everyone, right? So--if Adobe wants to have an "open" format, they should be required to have it open to all and not all but Microsoft. If not--Adobe should call it a "selectively open" format...

Jesus f*ckin Chr!st. First Apple act like a55holes and now Adobe are acting like a55holes. How incredibly stupid of them both.

EDIT:
Sorry if anyone is offended by my swearing but I'm just so annoyed!

No offended, but I would prefer if you used $$ instead of 55. It's just more aesthetically pleasing.

Well everything you said is absolutily true. I would have to say those two companies are probebly the top 2 on my hate list.

I'm not a moderator here, and I'm not a fan of censorship either... but even I think you should edit your post and remove the blatant swearing.

If you believe in Christ, I'm pretty sure you'd agree he'd be angry with using his name in the manner you did. If you don't believe in Christ, then why are you using his name to swear at something?

That said, just to clarify, which incident of Apple stupidity are you referencing?

Silly question, but isn't PDF becoming less relevant when the world's data is composed in XML or some variant thereof? PDF really can't claim document security anymore as anything can be encrypted (or cracked eventually).

I've using the excellent FinePrint and PDF Factory Pro for years, happily avoiding anything to do with the hateful Adobe corp.

OO good, I know im not the only one who relizes this.

Microsoft are the target of many anti-trust suites. I think that companies are starting to get trigger happy with crying foul. Built in PDF adoption will help Adobe if they play their cards right.

CORRECTION: Microsoft is NOT dropping XPS support, they have repeatedly stated that it will not happen. Should they remove XPS support, then they will basically kill XPS from ever being adopted.

Likewise, the PDF support is from a third-party, so Adobe should try to break that no-cost partnership -- and not go directly against Microsoft (who did not develop the Save-to-PDF features available in Office 2007 Beta 2).

You can save any document as a pdf on Macintosh computers... but you cannot open any pdf and change its content as if you were using Acrobat Professional. I suspect M$ was adding that capability to Vista, which would seriously cut into Adobe's Acrobat sales. It's not a double standard!!!

You obviously have no clue as to what an open standard is. If a file format is truly an open standard then any person or company that wants to should be able to include full support for editing and viewing files in that file format in their product free of charge.

IF ITS AN OPEN FORMAT THEN WHY CANT I EDIT IT FOR NO CHARGE?

Greedy bas****s. Adobe better not get away with this.

Adobe is perfectly right. Adobe made PDF open for benefit of public not Microsoft. Since Microsoft already has more than 80% market share in office productivity suite, it is difficult for others to compete and by integrating PDF in office, even there is chance that abode may loose its identity.
Good Call Adobe!

Considering Microsoft Office and Adobe Acrobat are NOT competitors (hint: Office allows editing, PDF format does not), Adobe's claims are groundless.

An Open standard is open. That means "competitors" can learn from it and adopt it. As long as MS doesn't tamper with the output (which they don't by using a freely-available 3rd-party adaptor) then the claims are 100% baseless.

It would be the same if MS sued OOo because it allows the editing of documents. LUDICRIOUS!

ismart hit his head on the concrete when he was little so he suffered some brain damage. He doesnt know what he's talking about.
(he's an idiot)

Ok, like i said earlier then, if Microsoft cant add it to their office program for free, then OO (which sucks) EVERY other office program NEEDS to remove it NOW!

Hey idumb

Which is it?

loose - free from a state of confinement, restraint, or obligation...

lose - to miss from one's possession or from a customary or supposed place

lol

If what is being said is true, then Adobe is turning PDF standard into a double standard. You can't pick and choose which company can implement an open standard.

It's clear that Adobe wants Microsoft to pay them to use the PDF open standard. Heck, Adobe needs the money. They can't continue making software for free. No one can.

It seems to me that no one is remembering the little incident with Sun vs Microsoft. I may be wrong but from what I remember Sun did give microsoft a licence for Java, and then Microsoft went and changed how the Java platform worked and created thier own version for use in windows. That might be the reason that this broke down, Adobe wanted a lock and MS wanted to revise and "Improve"

It seems to me that no one is remembering the little incident with Sun vs Microsoft. I may be wrong but from what I remember Sun did give microsoft a licence for Java, and then Microsoft went and changed how the Java platform worked and created thier own version for use in windows. That might be the reason that this broke down, Adobe wanted a lock and MS wanted to revise and "Improve"

I think the reason why Adobe has no problem providing PDF format to OpenOffice is that Sun is not making any money off of OpenOffice, since it is free. Microsoft WOULD be making money off of the Office suite, so Adobe surely deserves a say in whether it is to be included/licensed or not.

It's my understanding that Sun sells a commercial product called Staroffice that includes support for PDF. Yes, Staroffice may include support for some propietary formats not available in OpenOffice.org, but otherwise Staroffice and Openoffice.org are the same product. So Sun is making money from their office product.

Even Microsoft "makes money" off Office:Mac. They were allowed to have "File>Save as PDF" in that version ... Why can't they do the same thing with their Windows version? Adobe's just scared that the masses are finally going to realize that their little Acrobat family is now useless. It's Just like Norton Antivirus crying that Vista will put them out of business ... you can't blame Microsoft for finally making their software better.

Can someone recommend a good document format that supports embedded images etc like PDF?

Sure, it's called HTML.

We just need someone to make a zipbox...compress the whole site down. Oh wait XP already has zipped folders.

:D For give me if I hold out for more replies to the question.

MHTML is your answer. It is format that is supported by IE, all office products etc, that is essentially the html file, and all its related files in MIME format (same as email attachments). It is a standard not some MS format, you can also get a firefox extension to read and write mht files within firefox

Oh ya there is RTF, that oasis standard, open xml

I was strongly thinking about that option since Opera now supports it (viewing). Thanks for the suggestion!

i could be wrong, but i thought apple LICENSES adobe PDF format for it's os. it seems as if ms just wanted to use it for free.

It's an open standard file format.

Well considering its open file format I could certainly see why they would use it for free.

From what i can gather, Adobe hasn't threatenda lawsuit. MS is speculating/expecting/etal. that it will happen. The other part that doesnt' jive is that Adobe even publixshed a develop's reference for people who want to incorperate PDF into their applications.

What seems logical to me is that Adobe wasn't happy with the WAY MS implemented the feature.

I feel the hairs on the back of my neck stand up whenever Microsoft publicly declares itself the champion of open standards. This is somewhat akin to the local wolf-pack declaring it will guard the hen house at no cost (wink, wink, drool, drool).

I can easily see that it would be beneficial for Adobe to make pdf publishing open for Mac and Linux platforms while reserving the right to charge windows users for it. Windows users comprise something on the order of 93% of desktops world wide. When you buy Windows, you buy into the theory that all software and support is licensed and expensive. For Microsoft to suggest to any software vendor what its level of "open source" should be is absolutely insane and ridiculous at the same time.

When you run Linux you are subscribing to the theory that Software should be free and support is probably next to non existent. Adobe can afford to promote open pdf in the Linux community because at approx 3% of desktops worldwide it will never scratch their profitability (or at least no in my lifetime).

Microsoft deserves an ounce of credibility on open source issues the day it declares Windows to be Open Source, until that day I have two words for Microsoft "SHUT UP"

There are three utilties involved in .pdf technology, .pdf Reader which Adobe has made FREE and somewhat open, .pdf publisher which Adobe has made somewhat open and is used in most linux desltop publishing applications the third utility is the .pdf editor which allows you to open any .pdf file and completely alter any text, graphics or formatting then save changes.

I SUSPECT (don't know) that Microsoft was probably trying to encroach on the .pdf publishing license it has with Adobe to create a .pdf editor which would be a direct violation of the license and a direct competitor to Acrobat Professional and Adobe's other .pdf editor licensing agreements with other vendors such as ACD (Canvas)

" Microsoft deserves an ounce of credibility on open source issues the day it declares Windows to be Open Source, until that day I have two words for Microsoft "SHUT UP"
"

well put!

And everyone else has some words for you to stay for life,
"SHUT UP"

"And everyone else has some words for you to stay for life,"

who do you speak for?

keep your ignorant personal attacks to yourself

A$$

MS Corporation, thank you very much....:p

DirectX? Commdlg.dll? vbruntime? MSVC runtime? shell32.dll? Heck, even the .dll concept itself, .inf files (yeah, that's debateable--), etc. Microsoft has several dozen (if not several hundred) open-standards, and has had many of these since Windows 3.1. Microsoft is the champion of open-standards IMHO, there is no doubt in my mind.

Remember--Open standards != open source. I do not work for Microsoft, but you seem to be forgeting everything that Microsoft has done as far as standards. .dll files are big enough IMO, the .hlp and .chm formats too. NTFS file system? Bah, that doesn't count, right?

I agree, if one could use it then all should be able to use it. I don't use adobe PDF reader, I use Foxit, faster and better.

Although PDF claims to be an open format and is integrated into OpenOffice and Apple's Mac OS X operating system, Adobe apparently sees Office 2007 as a real threat to its business.

Everyone wants to sue MS. They put their browser in Windows they get sued. They put their meida player in Windows they get sued. They want to use PDF files in Windows and Office they get sued. Sure some of the things they get sued for my be valid but some of them are just really sad. So if the Xbox 360 sells more than the PS3 is Sony going to sue MS to stop making the Xbox? This is the type of bs our society is coming to.

Thats just sad, OpenOffice and Apple aren't a threat so they can use it, but MS Office is a threat so we're going to sue. Thats like me saying I don't want to have any friends better looking than I am because they may steal my girlfriend.

" So if the Xbox 360 sells more than the PS3 "

lol
i think not
:-p

I don't want to turn this in to a console war (it's just my opinion), but I think it'll be a lot closer this time.

If you look at sales now, the 360 is already ahead. :-)

I think the $599 price tag will scare a lot of people off too.

Then there's the Nintendo Revolution (what?... that's what it's called). They already said it's going to be less than $250 and my guestimation would be $199, even though this place thinks it might even be $149 http://planetgamecube.co...morsArt.cfm?artid=11675

I've probably rambled off topic too long, sorry.

Big mistake by Adobe. Actually, the biggest mistake at this point is staying quiet. Microsoft is being very loud about this today and now, instead of presenting its story fairly, Adobe must go on the defensive in the public image. Microsoft is clearly painting a picture of Adobe being the bad guy and Microsoft being the good guy for being compliant, whatever the truth be.

Personally, I've very disappointed to see this being left out of the standard installation. I've been using PrimoPDF, which is pretty good, but having it built into Office is a great thing. Oh well, guess I'll be downloading that Add-In (which hopefully will work the same as it does in Beta2 now).

How is it possible that Linux, Mac OS X and OO.O has PDF creation abilities, but they go ballistic when MS wants to put it into Office?! It just doesn't make any sense. If something is open source, let it stay open to everyone. Morons.

embrace, extend, exterminate. google it.

Good! PDFs are over sized and just suck!

That's like saying ZIP files are bloated and contain too much data.

That doesn't make any sense. It depends on who is create the PDF files. If you include pictures, RTF, lots of formatting, and its extremely large, then yeah, they are over sized..

PDF serve a very useful purpose, read me's are easier, since you can't modify the original contents.. easily.

PDF's are a good way to transport simple info, but ANYONE can fill up a bucket with unneed stuff and make it too heavy to carry, that's NOT the bucket's fault.

Zip files are bloated and contain too much data.

Take 2.5gb of nearly identical saved game files from a game like Kotor. 7-Zip them and you get a 10mb file. Zip them and you get a 300mb file.

I'd be happy if Zip went away and everyone got stuck with .7z and .rar

Minor correction: I think there's a licensing issue that prevents others from implementing RAR compression. All programs that I know only offer RAR decompression.

But yeah, 7z is good. :)

Dude you are freaking stupid! 100% freaking retarded! PDF files are much larger than most any other format! Most programs made to view or create them are slow and cumbersome and just ugly. Foxit is the best, but it is still a waist of time to use PDF. rijp, you are stuck in the 90's.

hmm, isnt it weird that M$ is backing off, after avoiding to backoff after 4 months of negotiations and now when they try to go to court, they backoff anyway? hmm, I suspect, M$ was about to do something behind Adobes back, which is more than what meets the eye, that could probably be why they are backing off. I never liked MS Office, but truth be told, I like to UI for Office 2007, but I am not getting rid of OpenOffice any time soon ( been a user since version 3.x, wont move off of it).
-GGR

*hmm, isnt it weird that M$ is backing off, after avoiding to backoff after 4 months of negotiations and now when they try to go to court,*

Uh..yeah, duh, that's called "negotiating". They couldn't come to terms, Adobe threatened to sue, Microsoft tried to continue on, and hopefully restart the talks, Adobe wanted to make it clear they were serious, so they sued, now Microsoft is dropping the PDF support, Adobe get's their way, end of suit.

Except now Adobe won't get a penny for their content. They could have licensed the PDF for like 10 bucks a OS copy, but they were greedy and wanted like 50, so, now they get zip.

Who loses in the end? Adobe... the fools.

So who is greedy? MS who corner 93% of the market and want to use PDF format on the cheap or Adobe who as come with a great program and want to be compensated for it.
If the king of proprietary software want to use it, they should pay for whatever Adobe feel is fair or walk. ADOBE must maintain the right to decide who can use it and at what price. MS is in no position to give lesson to anyone about open source.

Yah, its kind of funny how they were negociating about what they wanted to do for 4 months. That obviosly isnt doing anything behind {Adobes} back.

That sucks, Adobe is a resource hog and having it integrated into Vista would have been nice. Hopefully they will come to some technology licensing agreement and it will becomer reality.

WOW

that was nice of MS....
they must be up to something
:-o

Yeah, like tired of getting sued.. Its not up to something, they want to suit to go away.

Pow!!

That's the sound of Adobe shooting itself in the perverbial foot.

As much as I wish you were right, the PDF format will be just fine as it has always been. It is readable/writeable by default in almost every OS except Windows, and is supported by every office suite but MS Office.

Yet, when MS tries to join the game, they get singled out. Ironic, eh?

Yeah... ironic like the issues with WMP, IE, Java, RealNetworks, Kerberos implementation... it's like they keep picking on them and coming winners on court.

Who would say! :)

But MS's version (XPS) will be the default on the majority of systems.

This could *definately* hurt adobe's PDF format.

XPS is also utterly royalty-free. It's designed as cross-platform from the beginning. And even Adobe can use it without having to worry about being sued.

This is getting to be outrageous regarding how eager our society is getting to sue someone or some company. Actually, Microsoft might want to change their file format name from XPS because Dell will sue them because they use the same three letters for a model of their Dimension computer. (This is a very extreme example, but suing everyone just because you feel like it HAS TO STOP. I wish the courts would start throwing some of these groundless cases out.)

I can't find much about support on Mac OS X or Linux. Does cross-platfrom now just mean "between different versions of Windows" now?

Or is Microsoft going to be creating some sort of open developer's site?

I ask only for informational purposes.

I think that it wont be compatible for Apple computers until they release an updated Office version for it.

And I truely hope it does hurt Adobe's format.

I dont think that is a problem because, it is software and hardware.. not the same catagory.. so dell cant sue them. Coming to the actual topic.. Microsoft has every damn right to do whatever the s*** they want to with the PDF format because Adobe said it is an open format. I personally use a free PDF converter for office and I dont see why it cant be built into Office and reduce the hassle for many users like me.

Secondly, whoever is arguing that OpenOffice is better and free.. you are wrong. OpenOffice is a lousy piece of crap which "anti-MS" people love. They just wanna use OpenOffice because its free (10% of the reason) and the rest (90%) is because they hate MS. If you have ever used Office, you will never use OpenOffice again, cuz you realize that its roadside crap!

Microsoft should have every damn right to use PDF, ONLY because Adobe said its an open format and because there are about 20 FREE converters out there readily available.