Sharing Documents

It is common that documents may need to be shared via email, social media, or on a website. The problem is how to share these documents so everyone can access them, while editing is limited. The solution is a PDF. This file can be opened by a variety of different programs, including most web browsers. The files are generally smaller in size, so they are easy to email and store online. They are also saved in a way that they are less editable than, say, a Word document.

Most programs that you will use to develop documents (Microsoft, image editors, and websites) have an option to save the file as a PDF when it is completed. This “flattens” a document, meaning all the information needed to display it is included in the file. Don’t worry, you don’t need to understand how it works to use this valuable service.

Once this step is completed, the document can be posted online or emailed. These files can then be opened by the recipients in their web browser or a free PDF reader. While PDFs can be edited with paid software, it is more difficult to protect your documents to some degree.

The technology and legal details may fly over most of our heads, but the big win for the digital generation is FREE use of a truly independent electronic file format, the PDF. Of course, Adobe Acrobat PDF creation software is not free, but Adobe PDF Reader is totally free. And there are other free PDF creation tools such as http://www.pdfforge.org/pdfcreator. Using PDF files as email attachments and on websites is a customer service best practice.