Recently in the news, there have been stories about the new iPhone—the features, the how to’s, and the user favourites. Yet among these stories, there are also ones that don’t paint such an amusing picture as the rest of them do. While the gadget is highly loved for its many sleek and cool features, the size of the bill isn’t.

The gist (to save you a click): An iPhone user had posted up a video on YouTube showing viewers the length of her phone bill, most of which, according to the news, were recordings of instant data transactions which didn’t incur any costs. The length of this bill was 300 pages.

Being a pay-as-you-go cell phone user myself without a monthly bill in the mail from my service network, I was shocked at seeing a bill that had to be sent in a box. I don’t know if there are other phone/service bills out there like this one. Perhaps there are. But, this iPhone case is the first one that I had ever heard of.

As neat and compact as the iPhone is, its service bill has the potential to outweigh the gadget itself.

Reading from the AT&T site, forum comments, and other articles covering the story, the problem is solved easily enough by changing your billing options to ebilling—or opting to receive a less voluminous “summarized bill” for a small charge instead.


The former seems like a hands down better choice than having to pay for a hard copy of something you could save electronically—and, even more efficiently, in a PDF.


Connection to the topic at hand? If there was ever a real world example on a small scale of how computers could save paper, time, money, and the environment, it was shown in this story.


It’s just a matter of using your computer in the right way to avoid situations that can produce that kind of unnecessary waste. Ebilling is just one of them.


What are other ways in which you can help save the environment from right in front of your computer?

Here are five ways to get you started.

1)Work Digitally—A popular tip already being practiced. Using word processing and authoring applications saves on the amount of paper used to handwrite numerous drafts. If you have a laptop, portable device or some other electronic recording device, use it to take notes and record meeting minutes instead. Also, try to get in the habit of backing things up with external storage devices instead of in hard copy. When it becomes absolutely necessary to produce a printout, print double-sided copies.

2)Computer Parts—Yes, computers do take up a lot of environmental resources to make, and can create even more pollution than you can reduce. This also goes for getting rid of your old ones. How do you try and solve that one? The phrase, “Reduce, reuse and recycle” also applies to computers. Try out a refurbished computer when shopping for one, or donate and recycle your old one.

3)Subscribe, Download, and Email—Computers are great, if not made, for such things. You can cut down on the amount of garbage produced by software packaging and paper with a click of the mouse. And because the Web is a HUGE network, it’s the number one ideal way to distribute material and reach a wide range of readers on a global level.

4)Work at Home—Everybody’s dream. The best part about working with computers is that you can work from home. Computing technology has made it more than easy enough to access your office PC, communicate online, and collaborate over documents (--in PDF, of course). If you’re at home, there’s no need to drive in and add to the exhaust emissions hovering in the air. The picture perfect job, no?

5)Change Your Computer Habits—You can’t get far in helping the environment without doing so, electronically or not. The most energy being wasted due to computer use will depend upon the way in which you actually use your computer. Here are some energy saver tips to adopt and practice if you’re a Windows user or a Mac user.


Has going tech just been put into a whole new perspective? I think so.

Last time in this series, I gave you a sense of what you could do with your Excel conversions. With the Excel Special option, you could tailor the file output of your PDF to Excel conversion. With the Excel Custom Conversion option, you were able to designate a specific Excel document structure. What else can you do?

As if these features weren’t enough, there are Excel output options available that let you customize the Excel document’s appearance. This last posting in the series will give you an introduction to some of the features that allow you to do just that.

Under The View Menu

The following features can be found under the View menu, and will need to be set before you perform the actual conversion.

*Excel Single Worksheet—This option is set on as a default. It will convert PDF pages of your PDF to a single worksheet. Uncheck it, and it will convert each page of a multipage PDF into a workbook of separate worksheets.

*Excel Fonts—If your PDF has special fonts or colours and you need to retain them, turn this option on. If not, the PDF to Excel converter will use MS Excel fonts.

* Excel Spacing—This feature will modify the spacing of the columns of your conversion.


Options And MS Excel Output


There are also other options that can further tailor the appearance of your data conversion. To set these from the View>Options. . . . Here’s a listing of what you can do with the Output options:

*Trailing Minus Sign Treatment—Negative values are sometimes displayed with the negative sign to the right of the number. This function will let you convert the document with the minus sign at the beginning of the line.

*European Continental Settings—In some cases, the function of the decimal and the comma is reversed, where, for example, “1.000” represents one thousand and “0,85” for the equivalent 85/100, indicating a fractional value. This function will reverse that notational function to mean “1,000” and “0.85”.

*Enable Choose Column Type Dialog (Custom Excel Conversion)—When this is selected, you can use text formatting to store the values, skip columns altogether, or use default formatting.

*Enable Table Unfolding (Treat Rows As Columns And Vice Versa)—If you need to change the table set up, turning this function on will let you change the column headings into rows, and vice versa. The cell data will also be rearranged accordingly with the column and row headings to retain the integrity of the table.

*Retain Dollar Sign As Separate Symbol—Use this option to retain separate “$” symbols in the converted document.


And our upgraded version has a few extra Excel conversion features that might also come in handy:

*Use Text Format For Dates—When converting some documents, dates may be converted into numbers. Turn this function on to preserve the date in Text.

*Load Custom Excel Template and Save Custom Excel Template—With these features, you can save any custom conversion you make as a template. Select Save Custom Excel Template from the File menu once you have the column and row lines in the desired place. To use it later on, simply load it with the Load Custom Excel Template option when you convert tables with similar formatting.


A few tips about these functions:

*The Excel spacing will affect the appearance of the information within the cells. Depending on your data, some textual information may get cut off. Conduct a few trial tests with this option first for the visual output you want.

*Setting the features will be applied to all documents that are opened afterwards once it is set as the default.

*Using the Enable Custom Column Type to choose Text formatting for columns, the affected columns and cells in the spreadsheet will be noted in the Excel manner--with an indicator and with the value aligned to the left of the cell.

*When saving a custom template, the headers and footers you set are kept. Thus, if the template is being used for tables with similar column patterns, but varying lengths, you will need to make minor readjustments before you convert.


If you haven’t tried these features out yet, just take the time out to fiddle around with them, see what works best for your documents. You’ll be converting like a pro in no time!

We are proud to announce that we have officially launched the upgraded version of our flagship products, Able2Extract and Able2Doc. It’s a whole new version on a whole new level with a whole new look!

New Able2Extract 5.0 Features

This latest 5.0 version is sporting newer, more advanced features that lets you convert your PDF into more formats than ever before. We’ve managed to pack this upgrade with a lot more conversion options. Like what?, you ask. Read on.

First off the list, Able2Extract v.5.0 now offers PDF to Image conversions. Our new PDF to Image converter can generate popular image file formats, such as JPEG, BMP, GIF, PNG, and TIFF. You can designate the output directory, set image DPI and perform black and white conversions.

Second, with Able2Extract v. 5.0, you can now view and convert Microsoft’s new XPS document format. Convert XPS with all the same output features and conversion settings by simply opening and converting the format as you would a regular PDF file.

Third, this latest upgrade can support PDF Forms conversion. You can convert interactive PDF forms to editable Word Documents which you can fill out, save and modify later on. This conversion feature has the ability to retain form elements, such as text fields, radio buttons, and checkboxes.

Our Able2Doc v.4.0 can perform the same PDF Forms to Word conversion, and can also support XPS to Word conversion capabilities. Ideal for those who are only looking to convert to Word and TXT file formats.

Go ahead and sample these new features for yourself. You can download the free trial, in either the Standard or Professional versions, and take it for a test run. For ordering, product , and pricing details, check out our site—it, too, has undergone a bit of remodeling.


Enjoy!

If you convert PDFs on a regular basis, you’ll know that every PDF to Excel conversion is different. There are some that require a bit more attention than most. These are the conversions that don’t go too well the first time around with misaligned cells, skewed data output, poor formatting around headers and footers, or partial data conversions.

Able2Extract has a Custom Conversion feature that allows you to designate and set the formatting for PDF to Excel conversions that reduce these extraction problems significantly. This usage tip explains how.

1) Open the PDF to be converted within Able2Extract (Able2Extract Professional for scanned PDFs). Select the content to be converted.

2) Click on the Convert to Excel option. You’ll be given a choice to perform either an Automatic conversion or a Custom conversion. Select Custom, then click on Convert.

3 ) What follows will be a preview of your document with a grid of lines placed over the highlighted selection. These are the column and row lines which you can add, adjust, or delete altogether.

Although the startup wizard does contain instructions to guide you, here’s a little preview of what you’ll need to do when adding, removing or adjusting lines—which requires some mouse dexterity if you’re not used to right clicking!

• Adding lines—right click in the designated space where you want to add a line
• Remove lines—double right click on the line
• Adjust lines— right click and hold on the column line, then drag to move it

4) Once you have the lines in place, click on the Excel conversion icon again.


A few things to be aware of while using this conversion method:

*Although you’re custom converting to avoid misalignment between cells and data, you may still encounter some columns striking through your converted content that result from the vertical line placement and difference in multiple table formats. You can resolve this with a tip that was previously posted.

However, with our next version release, you’ll have the option of correcting the strikethroughs automatically where Able2Extract will produce another conversion which will readjust the results for your Excel output.

*With multiple data selections using the Custom conversion option, be aware that when you adjust the vertical column lines for one table, you’re also designating the formatting for any other tables you have selected. This issue usually plays a role in the data being struck through with vertical lines.

*In such cases where the formatting for multiple tables differ, it might be more appropriate to use the Convert to Special feature where you can convert each individual table and customize separate table formats. This way you can still perform custom conversions and export them into the same Excel file as well.

*The two adjustable horizontal lines will eliminate any headers and footers that occur between the pages when the selected content is spread over more than one page. Able2Extract will perform the conversion with empty Excel rows separating the tables to signify any page breaks that are in the original document.


Next up, will be a spotlight on the various Excel conversion output options which you can use to tailor that conversion process even more. Stay tuned!

I know that this week’s posting is slated to be part 2 on Excel conversion tips and features. However, this week in the PDF world, Adobe has come up with a resolution to the Send to FedEx Kinko’s link issue that hints at another innovative move for the company.

Earlier in June, Adobe announced that Reader 8.1 would include a Send to FedEx Kinko’s functionality. This was a highlighted feature both in reviews and on the AUC. Yet the functionality generated controversial reactions and backlash from printers and users which have been posted up on blogs, discussed in forums, and written in news articles. This is because the plug in endorses the FedEx Kinko’s franchise over other printing companies, printing companies that are also loyal users of Adobe software.

More significantly, during the month following, prominent printing associations requested a meeting and eventually met with Adobe July 18th to discuss the issue in a Print Industry Advisory Forum attended by top execs from the printing industry. Adobe was given until August 1st to evaluate and prepare their response.

Well, August 1st has just passed and Adobe has come up with an official response (.pdf). Previously, Adobe had posted an alternative for users to remove the functionality, which users can still access from the website if needed. Now, they’ve decided to pull the Send to FedEx-Kinko’s feature out completely.

What does this mean for the software? Instead of downgrading their products with the removal, Adobe will release an 8.1.1 version—without the link. The update is scheduled to be released in about 10 weeks, during which time the software will be modified and tested. As for Acrobat Professional, the link will be removed through Adobe’s automatic update program.

In addition, FedEx-Kinko’s will still offer a version of the Adobe Reader with the Send to FedEx Kinko’s link from their website, a move which seems to be a sampling of Adobe’s future direction.

The official FAQ (.pdf) released by Adobe states, “We believe that the addition of outputting to print providers from our products is something that customers value. We plan to work with our partners, via the Print Advisory Council, to explore some new ways of integrating this functionality into future Adobe products”.

From the looks of it, all parties are gearing towards a solution that works for everybody, and more importantly, a solution with another Adobe innovation in the works.


All for now on this issue!