Can anyone tell how to transcribe a Pdf document to a Word one please? I am using Office 2000.
I have been sent a very long Pdf text via email. I tried copy/paste into a blank Word file and it transferred right enough. However, it was displayed in a way that made it very hard to read - a series of paragraphs consisted, alternately, of a full line of text on one line followed by just one or two words on the next.
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The current versions of Adobe Acrobat and Nitro PDF Viewer can both convert PDF files to Office formats. You can download trial versions if you don't have either already.
You'll need to take care to save the converted file as .doc, not .docx, to be able to open it afterwards in Office 2000.
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Things might have moved on, but the last time I used a PDF to Word convertor it looked nothing like the original. It would have been quicker to retype it rather than faff around correcting the formatting! Can't remember what product I used though.
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About the best you'll get is a document that looks as if you'd saved a Word file to Rich Text Format, i.e. you might keep different formats for headings and main text, but it'll all be left-justified, no special characters (bullets, inverted commas etc.) retained and images (if copied) will be inserted on their own lines.
Still better than retyping it all, but, Ambo, if you need to edit it, is it not possible to get a Word version of the original from whoever sent it to you?
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>> if you need to edit it, is it not possible to get a Word version of the original from whoever sent it to you?
That looks like the easiest way to go and I will try it. Thanks to all for suggestions.
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>> Things might have moved on, but the last time I used a PDF to Word
>> convertor it looked nothing like the original. It would have been quicker to retype it
>> rather than faff around correcting the formatting! Can't remember what product I used though.
>>
That was the same conclusion I cam to when converting a ~100 page document, but that was 10 years ago so maybe things have moved on.
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I just converted a 30 page document using this website.
www.pdfonline.com/pdf-to-word-converter/
It seemed to work very well and maintained all the formatting. Although in one place it left the PDF as a picture AND the converted text, one on top of the other. That just involved deleting the picture frame though which only took a moment.
Give it a go, its free and it seemed to work, although this test is the *only* time I have used it.
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Word's later editions are not backward compatible, as I've found out in the past.
Try the Foxit converter (there's also a PDF Reader):
www.foxitsoftware.com/Secure_PDF_Security/convert-export.php
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Well on the basis if anyone can get this conversion to work properly it's Adobe, you can download a fully functional 30 day version of Acrobat XI from their web site; after jumping through a few hoops.
caution 500GB download!!!!
www.acrobat.com/free-trial-download.html
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that wouldn't fit on most peoples disk!!!
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>>caution 500GB download
You *sure* about that? I think you might have got your Gs and Ms muddled.
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>> >>caution 500GB download
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>> You *sure* about that? I think you might have got your Gs and Ms muddled.
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whoops yeah got me MB and GB crossed there I think!
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>> caution 500GB download!!!!
As others have said, are you sure?
Acrobat XI Pro system requirements:
Windows
•1.85GB of available hard-disk space
Mac OS
•1.5GB of available hard-disk space
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I don't know a lot about these things and am quite content to be called stupid. But, my simplistic understanding was that the purpose of making a PDF document was to prevent the recipient fiddling with it or amending it.
If this is the case then it should be pretty darned hard to un-PDF someone else's work.
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Very true, but it's sometimes useful to be able to extract things from a pdf. (Not plagiarism of course!)
Our scanning software has an OCR function, and if you open the pdf in the software, you can then transfer it to, in our case, OpenOffice Writer.
It loses the formatting, especially on complex documents, so you need to edit.
I do this when I'm terribly bored, so as not to waste the experience!
8o)
Last edited by: neiltoo on Wed 30 Apr 14 at 15:06
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The original idea behind PDF (and its competitors - there were several) was not that the document couldn't be modified intentionally, but that the recipient would get it looking the same as you intended it to instead of being accidentally mashed e.g. on sending from PC to Mac, or between different versions of word processor (and there was more than just Word out there when it came out, too).
An unintended, but handy, byproduct was that the recipient couldn't change the file. Adobe have since built on that by allowing you make PDF files where you can make limited changes. Useful for online forms where you want to be able to add details but not alter the form itself!
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Pdf to Word - Gromit
