PDF files sometimes cause a lot of trouble with viewing them, printing them and creating them. This page aims to introduce you to the range of tools that can be used to handle them - if one tool won't work on your file, perhaps another will.
Web browsers and email clients will launch a PDF viewer when they are instructed to display a PDF file. If this does not work properly, save the file to your home directory so that you can experiment with different PDF viewers. In a web browser you save a file by right-clicking on the link.
Once you have a PDF file in your filespace, there are several ways of viewing or printing it. If you have trouble reading or printing the file with one tool, try another.
| Linux command | Windows program |
|---|---|
| evince | |
| acroread | Adobe Reader |
| FoxitReader | Foxit Reader |
| gv | GSView |
| xpdf |
If you need to create a PDF file, the command ``ps2pdf'' will convert a PostScript file to PDF. The syntax for this command is ``ps2pdf input.ps output.pdf''. Sometimes PDF files created with this command will look a bit fuzzy on screen, but much clearer when printed out. If you're using TeX or LaTeX, it helps to create the PostScript file with ``dvips -Ppdf'', or use "pdftex" to create a PDF file from a TeX/LaTeX file directly.
If the result of ps2pdf isn't good enough, or if you need to convert a Word document, use a Windows machine. To convert a file, open it in the appropriate application and print it to ``Acrobat Distiller''.