I learn something (in fact, usually two or more somethings) at every single PDF event. Last week’s Adobe Acrobat PDF Conference in Orlando was no exception, and I’m not talking about Al Gore’s magnetic presentation on global climate change.
This tip is really worth the mention because it is so simple, yet of real value to those who deliver PDFs for presentation purposes. That’s a lot of folks (although not including Gore, who uses Apple’s Keynote).
(A BIG thank-you to Adobe Systems PDF Developer Evangelist Joel Geraci for this tip, and especially for not rubbing my nose in the fact that the solution was so near-to-hand!)
OK, perhaps you are wondering about my problem. Let’s take a look.
Open any PDF using Adobe Acrobat or Reader 8. Unless you view it in full-screen mode, you are very likely seeing a set of icons to the left side of the page.
In version 8, these icons provide access to a variety of systems that may be available within the document. The most familiar of these Navigation Panes are bookmarks and thumbnails, but there are at least 14 altogether, not including “auxiliary” panes. Click on a navigation pane button and the corresponding pane opens to the right.
Prior to version 8, navigation pane buttons consisted of tiny demure gray folders with overlapping hard-to-read labels nestled together on the upper left edge of the page. The design didn’t really help users switch between panes, but these little labels were so small and quiet they made virtually no impact on the presentation of the page, and were easily ignored.
Acrobat 8 introduced a much wider Navigation Panel Button bar, with big, brassy icons… but no obvious way to turn them OFF. Yes, you can right-click, Hide and Save each file, but that’s far too much like real WORK, and it can’t be done in batch, nor from a menu item, nor with a (published) javascript. In short, it’s Not Obvious, and it should be.
This is where Joel’s Acrobat 8 Tip of the Month Award comes in.
To HIDE the Navigation Pane Buttons, so your uses don’t suffer them when you don’t want them to, simply check Hide Window Controls in the Document Properties (Control-D) Initial View dialog. In Acrobat 8, this switch has effect of hiding both the navigation pane buttons AND the split-window icon and vertical scroll bar on the right side of the page. Critically, this feature may be managed on any number of PDF files at once using a simple Batch Process in Acrobat Professional.
Thanks, Joel!
Originally posted on Duff Johnson’s PDF Perspective blog for acrobatusers.com.
by Duff Johnson