~ Those annoying pdf files ~             Those annoying pdf files Version August 2005

Introduction    PDF-related essays Converting any file to PDF Converting an Acrobat PDF into ASCII The modern art of HTML2PDF conversion Enabling Print-Challenged PDF Files The use of pdf2txt@adobe.com De-protecting PDF files    PDF tools Cleaning Adobe bloated reader 6 "Remote Approach" pdf malware

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Adobe PDF2HTML:

URL:    EventualDocPasswd:
Pages: to: 1..99..1  Reformat  &Tags;

Ta-daaa!   Joseph Cox's Adobe Reader Speed-Up (v1.31): [ar-speedup.zip] : 149 Kbytes zipped   disables the majority of plugins (that are completely useless)   hence adobe, should you really be compelled to use it, will start in a wiff

Precious Item

A free, alternative and quick pdf reader instead of Adobe's monstruosity:
Foxit PDF reader: Free and QUICK reader for PDF documents. You can view and print them with it.
Its small (less than 1MB download. It doesn't need any lengthy installation, so you can start to run it as soon as you have downloaded it. It finds text inside the pdf documents, select it and copy.
And it starts up immediately, so you don't need to wait ages for many lengthy useless dlls loading or for an annoying "Welcome" screen to disappear.

And if you really want to create your own pdf-files...
PDFCreator easily creates PDFs from any Windows program. Use it like a printer in Word, StarCalc or any other Windows application.

Introduction

1.   [son_font.htm]: An essay on identifying and getting ahold of fonts
   by sonof, february 2003 part of the [Essays], of the [pdf], and of the [Targets] sections.
   With a script to extract fonts from pdf files
2. [getting a non-protected PDF file] by heather spoonheim (September 2002)
3. [Converting Word-Docs (or anything you like) to PDF] Some tips by ashok hariharan and other common knowledge methods
4. [The use of pdf2txt@adobe.com] by fravia+ (September 2000)
5.   How to create PDF-Files
   from any application that allows printing
   (The GSview approach)
   by hassan, May 2000
6. [Converting an Acrobat PDF into ASCII] by Wolfgang Redtenbacher (March 2000)
7. [Enabling Print-Challenged PDF Files] by Kayaker (March 2000)
8. by Zer0+, November 1997
   Quick starting notes and pdf again
   (boolean variables inside PDF files)
   
9. by Ragica, November 1997
   A Response to +ORC's Message Regarding reversing PDF
   the biggest collection ever (in fact the only collection ever so far!) of information regarding hacking PDF and links to relevant information
   (Kevin Lair CGI-hacks, the GhostScript hack, many good starting point for the USER crack)
   
10. by SiuL+Hacky, November 1997
    Linux cracking: the live approach (acrobat reader)
    Linux advanced reverse engineering: imported functions
    
11. by Snatch, November 1997
    Cracking all nag-screen and time-trial protections (Aerial32 as example)
    (Resource-ID fishing)
    
12. by JimBob, October 1997
    The Aerial trick
    How to crack any pdf security setting
    (The Aerial RTF format converter)
    
13. by zeezee, October 1997
    Create PDF documents for free reversing Adobe PDF Writer
    You know how to create .pdf documents? No? I will -shortly- explain it
    (another nice HIEW lesson)
    

1. One solution is to download Acrobat 4.0 (ca. 6 MB) from www.adobe.com, plus the accessibility plug-in (ca. 1.2 MB) from "access.adobe.com". This plug-in permits you to load a PDF file into Acrobat and save it as .TXT or .HTM.
2. An even better solution (regarding program size and conversion quality) is the program "pdftotext" which is part of the XPDF-package (a freeware PDF viewer for several operating systems).

Hello,

>> where can i find source code for converting html files
>> to pdf format, source code being in java.

several tools exist for that purpose.

I searched in google for "HTML Java PDF Conversion".

I found iText, which is an open source PDF library in Java that already has 
capabilities of converting HTML to PDF.
On
http://www.lowagie.com/iText/links.html
are links to several other PDF engines in Java.
iText is an open source project hosted on sourceforge.

But the "modern art of HTML2PDF conversion" is the 
following:
1. Make sure the HTML files are valid XHTML (or at least well-formed XML).
2. Use a transformation stylesheet that transforms HTML to XSL Formatting 
Objects using XSL Transformation. Apply that stylesheet using an XSLT 
processor like xt, xalan, saxon...
3. Run a Formatting Objects engine (like FOP from James Tauber / Apache 
Group) that converts the generated FO-Tree from step 2 to PDF.

Most XSLT processors and most Formatting Objects engines are written in Java, 
including all mentioned products (xt, xalan, saxon, fop) and come with their 
source code.

The following points must be kept in mind:
- - Knowledge
XSLT and XSL:FO are 1-4 new languages to learn (depends on the point of view 
and your knowledge, my opinion is that it's four languages altogether: XML, 
XPath, XSLT and XSL:FO, but these are quite easy languages)
- - Development speed
XSLT Stylesheets and XSL Formatting are quite easy to learn and very quick to 
develop.
It takes only few time to write an XSLT stylesheet.
- - Servlet Usage
XSLT and XSL:FO are usable as servlets.
- - Performance
Java native library performance might be considerably better.
- - The XSLT and XSL:FO is highly configurable. You control nearly every pixel 
(resp. point) of the resulting PDF.

But I've never used the non-XSL:FO way, so I can't say much about that.


Just my 2 cents.

Greetings

- -- 
Christian Wolfgang Hujer

Position	Identifier	Menu Item

0		1770		Open
1		0		Separator
2		1772		Close
3		0		Separator
4		1774		Page Setup
5		1775		Print
6		0		Separator
7		FFFF		Document Info (submenu)
8		FFFF		Preferences (submenu)
9		0		Separator
A		1783		Adobe Online
B		0		Separator
C		1785		Recent File 1
D		17CC		Recent File 2 (up to 4 files)
E		0		Separator
F		1787		Exit

000001  0137:0054C117  FF159C295700    CALL  [USER32!EnableMenuItem]

  // check for print permission
  if (!doc->okToPrint()) {
    error(-1, "Printing this document is not
allowed.");
    goto err1;
  }
                

How to use liposuction to repair Adobe Reader 6
And give it mouth-to-mouth respiration too

(article by Fernando Cassia taken from The Inquirer and published on searchlores in february 2004)


I reported some time ago on the slooooooow nature of Adobe's latest version of the acrobat (.pdf) reader, recently renamed "Adobe Reader" by their marketing spinmeisters. See "Adobe's quiet release of Reader software causes people to scream".

And just a few days an e-mail from a reader, Kelly Cook, sneaked into my inbox, claiming to have found a way to trim the fat off Adobe Reader 6, and improving its load time to more reasonable levels. Apparently the reader spotted this info on a Mac-related blog and decided to try it on the Windows version. I have tried it myself and guess what, it worked.

On my tests, I decided to use the "lowest of the low-end" system: my Thinkpad 380ed with a Pentium I-MMX class CPU. Before the liposuction, Adobe Reader 6 took 41 seconds to load (without any PDF file), after the fat-removal procedure, it took 20 seconds. On high-end systems, however, the results are more dramatic: Kelly claims Adobe Reader 6 took over 20 seconds to load on a 1.8 Ghz. Pentium 4 system, and just under two seconds after the procedure.

So here are the dirty details

Install Adobe Reader 6 :)
From the Start->Run windows menu, Open the "x:\Program
Files\Adobe\Acrobat 6.0\Reader" folder, where x is the right drive letter.
Find the plug_ins folder and rename it plug_ins_disabled
Create a new folder named plug_ins
Copy the following files from "plug_ins_disabled" to "plug_ins": EWH32.api, printme.api, and search.api

Of course this will limit the functionality to viewing non-encrypted pdf files, but that's exactly what I want Acrobat ^B^B^B^B^B Adobe Reader for, 99.9% of the time. You might want to experiment leaving some of the fat in, I mean, .API files, like reflow.api and search5.api (if it's there), and see how it affects functionality and load times.

With the files listed, you get half the load time on low-end systems, and a 2-sec load time on high-end ones. Still, you might want to prefer using Acrobat Reader 4.05 on old systems, since it loads in just seven seconds instead of 20.

Your mileage might vary. Liposuction is a dangerous clinical procedure. Consult your doctor. All lawsuits and claims should go not to me, but to our editor and our reader Kelly. ;)

"Remote Approach" pdf malware

"Remote Approach" pdf malware

The following taken from http://lwn.net/Articles/129729/

Unexpected features in Acrobat 7

(This article was contributed by Joe 'Zonker' Brockmeier)
	
Linux users may have been pleased to find that Adobe has finally
made available a new version of its Acrobat Reader, with
accessibility features, a much slicker interface than Acrobat 5.x
and new and other spiffy features. However, there are a few other
features that Linux users should be aware of.

A company called Remote Approach is promising to alert PDF
publishers as to the "reach and use of their materials." We were
curious to find out how Remote Approach was going to make good on
its promise, given that PDF has largely been seen as a one-way
medium. To find out, we created a test account and uploaded a PDF
to be "tagged" by Remote Approach, and then downloaded the
modified document to see whether Remote Approach could log our use
of the document.

Remote Approach's reporting did not work when we viewed the
document with Kpdf, Xpdf and Adobe Reader 5.0.10. It also failed
using Apple's "Preview" application on Mac OS X. The document was
still viewable with no apparent glitch in other PDF readers, but
the reporting function did not work. However, when we opened the
file using Adobe Acrobat Reader 7, Remote Approach started logging
views from our IP address. After doing a little research, we found
that Adobe's Reader was connecting to
http://www.remoteapproach.com/remoteapproach/logging.asp each time
we opened the document. The information is submitted over port 80
using HTTP, so it is unlikely that a home or office firewall
would, in a normal configuration, block the activity, unless the
firewall administrator is attempting to block Web browsing.

Apparently, Remote Approach's "tag" to our document included the
addition of JavaScript code causing Acrobat to report back to
their server; the information reported includes the fact that the
document had been read, our IP address, and which viewer it had
been read in. (Interestingly, Remote Approach does not seem to
recognize the Linux version of Acrobat Reader, as it left the
"User Agent" field blank in its reports.)

What many Linux users may not have realized, since Adobe did not
release an Acrobat Reader 6.x for Linux, is that Adobe has added
JavaScript support to PDF and the official Acrobat readers since
Acrobat 6.x. For those interested in the JavaScript support and
its abilities in Acrobat, see Adobe's scripting reference or
scripting guide. (Both are PDFs, of course.)

By default, Adobe Reader 7 turns on JavaScript, so the "tagged"
document is able to "phone home" without the user's awareness.
Turning off JavaScript disables the document's code, and prevents
Remote Approach (or any other entity) from tracking views of the
document. No doubt, Remote Approach is using features that would
normally be used to submit information from a PDF form.

The inclusion of JavaScript in Adobe Reader 7 for Linux no doubt
provides a number of welcome features for users, but it also
raises some privacy issues. The reader does not inform the user
that information is being submitted, so users are likely to be
oblivious to the fact that another party is aware of their PDF
reading habits. While a user may not find it objectionable to
notify the publisher, there are those of us who don't care to
allow publishers to snoop on activities taking place on our
personal computers.

Lucky for us, there are plenty of alternatives to Adobe's Reader.
Free PDF readers are unlikely to adopt features allowing the
reader to silently phone home in response to code stored within
the document itself. If you must use Acrobat, however, you may
want to have a look at the JavaScript settings first.

(pointed out by Kane)

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(c) III Millennium: [fravia+], all rights reserved, reversed and deserved