Adobe Reader and Acrobat - Content Preparation Progress: Please wait while the document is being prepared for...

We have a client that is being bugged by this prompt when opening certain PDF files.

Content Preparation Progress

Please wait while the document is being prepared for ...

Status: Processing page 23 of 27 ...

Adobe has a KB article on this:

• Acrobat Help: Message "content preparation progress" when opening a PDF file

The solution is to do the following:

1. Go to Edit
2. Preferences
3. Reading
4. Under Screen Reader Options select Only read the currently visible pages

The dialogue has to do with accessibility.

Philip Elder
Microsoft Cluster MVP
MPECS Inc.
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
Third Tier: Enterprise Solutions for Small Business

Adobe Flash Player Cache Management

It’s always been a bit strange that we need to go to a third party site in order to manage content on a local computer.

• Adobe Flash Player Help: Website Storage Settings panel

Using that control panel we are able to see just what kind of things have been happening, at least to some degree, via the Adobe Flash plugin.

Besides that, there is Start –> Internet Options and DELETE to remove history.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

QuickBooks 2013 and Flash – Install the Database Setup on a Server And . . .

We get Flash!

We're not 100% sure where exactly Flash is required when it comes to the Database Manager for Intuit's QuickBooks.

But, it's not a really happy thing to be installing Flash on a server. :(

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

Chef de partie in the SMBKitchen
Find out more at
www.thirdtier.net/enterprise-solutions-for-small-business/

Windows Live Writer

Adobe Acrobat and Reader 10.1.2 Downloads Available

We avoid the Get Adobe Reader page due to unwanted extras like toolbars.

• FTP: Adobe Reader 10.1.2 download page (EXE file here)
• FTP: Adobe Acrobat 10.1.2 download page (MSP file here)

404 Tech Support has an excellent How-To for deploying Adobe MSI and MSP via Group Policy here:

• 404 Tech Support: How to Apply Patches (.msp) to Group Policy Deployed Software (.msi)

We deploy the initial product MSI via Group Policy. We will be investigating the above procedures to update both the source MSI but also to deploy the subsequent MSP patches.a

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Ordering Acrobat Licensing With “Software Assurance”

Here are the part numbers for ordering Acrobat Standard with an additional 24 months of version up coverage:

• 65086303AD01A00: Acrobat Standard 1 License 1 User
• 65083859AD01A24: Acrobat 24 Month Upgrade Plan 1 User

Given that Adobe is committed to scaling up their version up frequency having some version upgrade options going forward is a good thing.

The second part number can be renewed on the 24 month anniversary so costs will go down relative to the first upfront cost of the license.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

How To: Adobe Acrobat: Rotate Pages and Save Them

We received a document that was scanned into PDF upside down.

When we saved the PDF into our SharePoint site and opened it we then went to View –> Rotate View –> Clockwise. We then saved the PDF and re-opened it. But the pages were upside down when we opened it.

After some searching we came up with the following method for Acrobat X:

1. Open the PDF document.
2. Click on Tools
• 
3. Click on Pages to open its menu.
4. Click on Rotate.
• 
5. Set the Direction for the rotation and click OK.
• 
6. Save the PDF.
7. Close it then re-open it.

The pages will now display correctly.

Hat Tip: AcrobatUsers.com Save rotated page.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Robert Crane – How-To Set Up PDF Indexing In The SBS 2011 SharePoint Foundation Companyweb Site

Robert Crane has an amazing skillset when it comes to all things SharePoint.

He has published a How-To to enable SharePoint to index any PDFs that have live text in them here:

• Computer Information Agency: Indexing Adobe PDFs in SharePoint Foundation 2010

What does this mean?

It means that folks can search for and find almost anything _within_ a PDF document that is hosted on the SharePoint Companyweb site.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Adobe Offers Subscription Model For Software

We currently hold a license for the Adobe Creative Suite 3 Premium software. We use InDesign, Photoshop, and Illustrator primarily for designing various publications from books through to pamphlets. We also use the Adobe Acrobat Pro features quite a lot.

We were looking to upgrade to Creative Suite 5.5 when it releases sometime next month.

Our price to upgrade from CS 3 Premium to CS 5.5 Premium (CS 5 today with up to CS 5.5 for free) when it comes out is:

When we click on the Upgrade Eligibility link we see:

So, our price is $799.00 for the download version of the product. Given the strength of our Canadian dollar against the US dollar we are wise to purchase today. There were times in the past when we were purchasing at $.60 Canadian to the US dollar!

Now, if we were looking into getting things set up for the first time or if we were beyond the Upgrade from 1 Suite position we would probably look at Adobe’s new subscription model.

For $1,140.00 per year we would have the required license plus access to the newest version when released without too much fuss. In the end it may be a bit less expensive to run with the subscription model, however one would need to keep in mind that when the subscription lapses so do the licenses.

• Adobe Buying Guide: Suite Editions
• Adobe Buying Guide: Subscriptions

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Adobe Acrobat Error – Crash On Two Opened Documents ATIUMDAG.DLL

A client of ours has been experiencing a crash in Adobe Acrobat when they try and open more than one PDF file.

The component responsible for the crash was ATIUMDAG.DLL.

When this crash happens uncheck Use 2D graphics acceleration under Page Display in Acrobat’s Preferences.

Close Acrobat after making the settings change and then try opening two different PDF documents. Acrobat should open properly from there on.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Mitigating the Adobe Acrobat PDF Attachment Launch Problem

This via Susan.

To mitigate the problem where an executable is embedded in a PDF file, we need to make a change in Adobe Reader/Standard/Professional:

In the Trust Manager uncheck the Allow opening of non-PDF file attachments with external applications.

Since we want _all_ of our client user’s Adobe products to have this setting disabled, we are going to push the above out via Group Policy. We are also going to push a setting out that disables the user’s ability to enable this setting in any affected Adobe product.

The above registry settings and a description are discussed on the Adobe Reader Blog here:

•  Adobe Reader Blog: PDF "/Launch" Social Engineering Attack

Now, off to get our client’s computer security GPOs updated with the above.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Acrobat 9.0 Standard Has How Many Updates?

As we go through and install Adobe Acrobat 9.0 Standard on a client’s workstations, the very next step after the install is to update the installation.

Now, Adobe’s updates are not cumulative which means we need to install each update in sequential order.

We mitigate the bandwidth issue by having a copy of the updates, yes we have signed the agreement to do so with Adobe, or by downloading the updates to a network share via the first install and using those to install the rest.

Here they are as of this writing:

Yes, that is close to 500MB of updates in the folder.

So, the order to install is as follows:

1. AcroProStdUpd910_T1T2_incr.msp
2. AcrobatUpd912_all_incr.msp
3. AcrobatUpd920_all_incr.msp
4. AcrobatUpd930_all_incr.msp
5. AcrobatUpd931_all_incr.msp

There is no need to reboot the system when warned to do so while running the updates. The final update may or may not ask to reboot. Once the updates are completed the workstation should be rebooted though.

Keep in mind that depending on speed of the system the updates may take a while.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Adobe Acrobat 9.x Pro Trial – PDF Printing Fail

While we are waiting for our Acrobat Standard licensing order to go through for some new workstations here, we installed the trial version of Acrobat 9.x Professional via a download from Adobe’s site.

While there are other products out there to use for generating and working with PDF documents, some are even free, we prefer to run with Acrobat Standard for basic PDF generation and modification needs.

Yes, Acrobat, and any product that works with active data PDFs, has had their fair share of vulnerabilities lately, but now that they are getting a lot of attention from the bad guys they sure are cleaning up their code! Hopefully this realization transfers the need to keep their code tight to the new codebase for Acrobat version 10.x.

We choose Acrobat Standard because the product just works. We have tried to work with others out there, but they all have their quirks and hiccups to get working on a buttoned down network like ours.

A mandatory credentialed Windows Vista/7 UAC setup via Group Policy on our network is probably the one biggest killer for some of the PDF products we have tried.

The one catch with running Acrobat 9.x Standard or Professional on a 64bit OS is to run the product update after installing to get the PDF Printer to show up.

Anyway, back to the trial version:

We generate a lot of PDF documents from the various software products we use. We are virtually paperless in many aspects of our business. While some software products have a PDF generator built in such as QuickBooks (rarely works), others do not. So we need a dedicated PDF generation solution.

With the trial version we are able to generate one or two PDF documents via the PDF Printer before the above message comes up and prevents us from generating anymore PDF documents.

So, we need to log off and then back on again, as the activation prompt does not want to come back even though something was blocking the PDF generation.

This is a very frustrating situation for us as the trail version is supposed to work just as a normal version would for the full thirty day period. But, it activation nags every time we log on and open Acrobat Pro and does not seemingly make the PDF Printer work as expected once the nag screen has been acknowledged.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*Our original iMac was stolen (previous blog post). We now have a new MacBook Pro courtesy of Vlad Mazek, owner of OWN.

Windows Live Writer

Adobe Releases Version 9 Patch for Acrobat Vulnerability

The security bulletin is here: Security Updates available for Adobe Reader 9 and Acrobat 9.

While there were ways to somewhat protect ourselves from this one, many of them were difficult to implement without impacting business processes such as disabling Java within Acrobat.

Update links are contained in the above bulletin. Adobe’s automatic updates may catch the update if set to check for them.

Given the high priority of this update, it is a good idea to get them down onto the Technician’s Thumb Drive as well as on all of our client’s servers and get those Acrobat products patched!

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists
Co-Author: SBS 2008 Blueprint Book

*All Mac on SBS posts will not be written on a Mac until we replace our now missing iMac! (previous blog post)

Windows Live Writer

Adobe releases Acrobat Reader 9

Adobe has released a new version of Adobe Acrobat Professional and Acrobat Reader.

From the Adobe Acrobat Reader release email:

Adobe is pleased to announce the release of Adobe Reader 9 for our Tier 1 languages of English, French, German and Japanese. Other major languages will follow next month.

Highlights of Reader 9 release
This latest version adds new functionality for sharing ideas, creating PDF files, protecting information, and enhancing users’ overall experience. Take a look at just some of our new features:

• Improved launch speeds: Experience enhanced general performance and reduced launch times.
• PDF Portfolios: Easily navigate through diverse collections such as drawings, e-mails, spreadsheets, and videos—all in a single file.
• Adobe Flash® software support: View rich media content such as Shockwave®, Flash, and streaming video files.
• Acrobat.com: Create PDF files online, coauthor documents with others, upload and store files, including hosting live web meetings. (English version only)

Once a major new version such as this comes out, you have 6 months to update from your older Reader 8.

Current 9.0 file FTP download links (right click and save as):

• 35,124,856 AdbeRdr90_en_US.exe
• 26,390,112 AdbeRdr90_en_US_Std.exe
• Terms and Conditions Text File
• Acrobat FTP Directory (For all editions)

The above public links bypass the need to install the Adobe Download Manager for a Web browser and an optional toolbar.

This is one set of downloads that we will add to our Technician's Thumb Drive and also to our application install points on our managed networks.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists

*All Mac on SBS posts are posted on our in-house iMac via the Safari Web browser.

Adobe Photoshop - Automating the same changes to a bunch of images

We have a client that we just finished scanning a whole bunch of architectural sketches into high resolution Photoshop files.

We now need to render those files to TIFF format for their access as well as small JPG format for email use.

There are close to 200 80-150MB files. Can you imagine opening each file then "save as" twice for the two required formats? We would be here for hours if not days.

So, to do that in Photoshop, we need to create a "Batch Process" that will automate the whole thing for us.

Initially searching across the Internet did not yield any results on the how-to because we did not know the proper terminology to use in the search. The keyword is "batch".

The best tutorials that we have found:

• Wired: Batch Process Images in Photoshop (Windows)
• Creative Mac Tutorials: Batch Processing in Adobe Photoshop
• CreativePro: Get Better Output with Photoshop's Automate and Scripts Menus

Now that we know how to run a batch job to render the images, we can sit back and have a tea while the system runs the job.

UPDATE: For doing the actual conversion process, there is a built-in Image Processor that the CreativePro link indicates. It works on both the PC and the Mac.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists

*All Mac on SBS posts are posted on our in-house iMac via the Safari Web browser.

Windows Vista x64 - Adobe Acrobat 8 Professional "Printer" not Generating PDFs

Out of the box, we had a couple of issues with installing Adobe Acrobat 8 Professional (previous blog post).

So, we have not been able to use the product to generate PDFs via the built-in printer AdobePDF setup.

When trying to diagnose what was going on we went into the Adobe Printing Preferences. Initially the "Adobe PDF Folder" was blank. When clicking the down arrow for any options, the only one available was LPT1:.

So, we selected LPT1:

Adobe PDF Printing Preferences & Properties

Click the General tab in Adobe PDF Properties, click on the Print Test Page button, and bingo! We have a standard Windows Printer Test Page that indicates we have correctly installed our Adobe PDF Converter.

Well, the next step was to figure out how to get it to prompt us to save the PDF in a directory.

We have another system setup with Acrobat Pro running on Windows XP Professional, so we took a look:

Adobe PDF Properties on XP Pro

So, on our Windows Vista x64 Adobe Acrobat Professional 8 did not setup those ports.

From Adobe's support site: TechNote: Error "Warning 20225..." or no Adobe PDF printer appears (Acrobat 8.0 and Acrobat 3D 8.0 on Windows).

Acrobat is not supported on a 64-bit operating system [emphasis ours]. Acrobat 8 should be able to install the printer but not the Adobe PDF port on the 64-bit operating systems; although, the remainder of Acrobat functionality should remain intact. In addition, Acrobat is unable to install the printer if extended ASCII or double-byte characters are found in the path names. Third-party programs can interfere with the installation of the printer by attaching services to the Print Spooler service or installing print monitor software. Lexmark and Dell printers are known to install services such as lexbce.exe that can generate this error message.

There is not Detect and Repair on our help menu either.

Some things are just to goofy...click "Check for Updates" and the first thing it does is download 168MB of updates.

The first one it installs is on Acrobat, so after the update is done, guess what:

Adobe PDF Port is now available

Adobe, you have great timing! :D The Help --> Repair Acrobate Acrobat Installation menu item is there too.

Some further links:

• Adobe's statement on Windows x64 support: Support policy for Adobe Acrobat 8.0.x Windows x64.
• Adobe Forum thread: Support for Windows 64 bit.

Kudos to Adobe for bringing about an update to support those of us who have paid the big bucks for their products.

It is good to see!

UPDATE 2007-09-25: Okay, my bad ... It is Acrobat not Acrobate! :D

UPDATE 2008-08-26: As per the comments:

1. In the Printer list delete the Adobe PDF printer
2. In Acrobat run the repair routine.

Once the repair has run, you may need to update your Acrobat installation to the newest revision.

That works.

Thanks to those who commented for contributing a fix! :)

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists

*All Mac on SBS posts are posted on our in-house iMac via the Safari Web browser.

Adobe Photoshop CS2 - Multiprocessor Update

Did you know that there was an update to Photoshop on both Mac and Windows platforms for improved multi-processor support?

The update improves Photoshop's utilization of the new multi-core CPUs.

Update: Multiprocessor Support for Adobe Photoshop CS2 for Windows.

Update: Adobe Photoshop CS MultiProcessor Support update (Mac).

There are also similar updates for earlier versions of Photoshop.

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists

*All Mac on SBS posts are posted on our in-house iMac via the Safari Web browser.

Adobe Design Center - Video Tutorials

We build all of our client publications, Technical Assessment books, as well as our own in-house publication needs on the Adobe Creative Suite Premium. We are currently on version CS2 and are looking to upgrade to CS3 shortly.

In the process of investigating the differences between the CS versions, we stumbled on a great Adobe tutorial resource for their products: Adobe Create Suite 3 Video Workshop.

Not only is this a great marketing ploy, it truly provides good product feature information to those who are investigating the products, and it helps those who already use the products to augment their skills.

An important spin-off to providing these tutorials is to generate a genuine interest in those viewing them to look into in-person classroom or in-house training.

Excellent! :D

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists

*All Mac on SBS posts are posted on our in-house iMac via the Safari Web browser.

Adobe Acrobat Reader versions 7 & 8 download links.

I do not like download managers. That is, I do not like having to install some vendor's piece of software in order to download and install another piece of the vendor's software.

So, when I am forced into a situation where there is a download manager, I look around for alternatives.

Adobe is one who wants a download manager installed first before I can download and install Acrobat Reader.

By looking for alternatives, I also get to avoid any other software pieces that get "tied" into the download such as the advert for the Google Toolbar. It is an option available via the Adobe download page.

So, after hunting around, I found this link for Acrobat version 8: Download Acrobat Reader Version 8 (.exe).

And, this link for Acrobat version 7.0.9: Download Acrobat Reader Version 7.0.9 (.exe).

These links are freely available via Softpedia Acrobat Downloads with the downloads directly from Adobe's site.

The links are current as of 2007-04-06. If they are broken, let me know and I will fix them.

UPDATE 2007-12-24: A link to the newest version: Adobe Acrobat 8.11 (MSI File).

UPDATE 2008-02-05: A link to the newest version: Adobe Acrobat 8.12 (MSI File).

Philip Elder
MPECS Inc.
Microsoft Small Business Specialists