Adobe Publisher (or whatever) trial version?

[ffutures]

Since

1: I really would prefer not to buy pirated software,
2: I would really prefer to sort out the layout problems for myself, and
3: Publisher costs a lot more than I am likely to make from the PDF project

Can anyone tell me if the trial version includes Distiller, and if there are any limitations on it that will make it impractical to use to make the PDF? I know that there is a limit of 30 days on it, but are there any other problems, e.g. watermarking pages, that would stop it from being useful?

Alternatively, are there any alternatives to Distiller, either for Mac or for PC?

Comments

[pmcray.livejournal.com]

OpenOffice will import and export .doc files and includes a feature to create pdfs.

[autopope.livejournal.com]

I'm not certain but I suspect the OS/X version of OpenOffice, NeoOffice/J (which is now released and usable, if a bit eccentric-looking) uses OS/X's standard PDF export feature.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Seems likely - looks like the ghostscript thingy will do a lot of what I want, I'm just trying to get it to work. Sourceforge are nice people, but they don't always make it easy to know exactly what bits of software you need...

[bibliogirl.livejournal.com]

Try PDFCreator (http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator/)?

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

And for some reason Ghostword won't work on my PC. No idea why, it just won't; says it can't find Word, and suggests I reinstall Word.

Bloody wonderful.

[sbisson.livejournal.com]

There are lots of PDF printer tools out there - from Adobe's own Acrobat (they even run a free web based PDF creator), through various alternative commercial packages, and then there are plenty of free and open source alternatives (as Adobe make the file format for PDF open).

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

I've just tried two and got nowhere, which doesn't fill me with confidence. PDF creator appears to do what I want but doesn't actually appear to save files - I think it may not be connecting to Ghostscript properly - and Ghostword doesn't want to work at all.

I think I may uninstall them from the XP box and try them on the Windows 98 machine tomorrow. I have a feeling that one or another of Microsoft's recent XP "upgrades" may be screwing things up.

Do you have an address for the web version of Acrobat?

[the-tall-man.livejournal.com]

I use a PDF printer. PDF995, I think it's called. Works like a charm; smooth and easy. Filesizes are a touch bigger than 'best', though.

[ffutures.livejournal.com]

Is this one PC or Mac?