Tech Geek

I do not own Adobe Acrobat and I probably never will. I'm sure it's a very fine program, but I doubt I'll ever be able to justify the high cost for the limited amount of time that I would use it. But there are times that I need to do a little more with a PDF file than just view it. I recently found a new-to-me tool that gives you a lot of functionality for free and lets you do even more for only $20/year.

PDFill PDF Editor lets you create and edit, including adding form fields to be filled in later, PDF files. I may very well buy this and use it next year to create my Medical Release Forms in a PDF format that can be filled out on the computer and then printed. I haven't played with those features yet. I have played with the features that allow you to easily merge, split, and re-order the pages in PDF files.

After you download PDFill PDF Editor from http://www.plotsoft.com/download.html you will have a trial version of the editor installed that adds watermarks to anything you do. You will also have the Free PDF Tools and the Free PDF & Image Writer that come with the package. These do not require you to register in order to gain full functionality.

When you first run the program, it will scan your system to see if you have GhostScript installed. If you don't, a window will pop up asking you to download it, either automatically or manually. I clicked the Download Automatically button and it started the installation automatically. You must install GhostScript in order for the software to work. GhostScript is an open source PDF interpreter and PDFill provides a graphical front end for this software.

Once the GhostScript installation completes, you will have a new printer driver installed that lets you print to a PDF file or to an Image (PNG, JPG, BMP, TIF, or GIF) file. First, run PDFill PDF and Image Write (Free) from your Programs menu and select the output settings you could like. I un-checked the box next to Simple GUI (Hide this Dialog in Saving File) so that when I use the printer driver it asks me what format I want to end up with. Then go to whatever program you're working from and use the Print command to send the file to this tool.

The other free tools are under PDFill PDF Tools (Free), which you can also run from your program menu. From http://www.plotsoft.com/pdf_tools_free.html you can see all the capabilities of this tool:

1. Merge Merge two or more PDF files into a single PDF file.
2. Split or Reorder Extract pages from a PDF file into a new file.  Reorder the page sequence into a new file.
3. Encrypt and Decrypt with Security Options Encrypt or Decrypt PDF documents (Master Password or User Password may be required).  Protect PDF files with passwords and prevent PDF files from being printed, copied, changed, filled, extracted, signed, assembled or merged. Supports Adobe® Standard 40-bit Encryption and Adobe® Advanced 128-bit Encryption
4. Rotate and Crop Rotate a PDF page by 0, 90, 180 and 270 degree. Crop a page to modify its layout of Print or View by specifying its margins.
5. Reformat Put multiple pages into one page to save paper and inks when printing hard copies. Add note lines for handout.
6. Header and Footer Add Headers and Footers to present information, such as date, time, page numbers, or the title of the document, in the top or bottom margins of a document.
7. Watermark by Stylized Text Add Stylized Text Stamp.
8. Watermark by Image Add Stamp using image file (bmp, jpg, gif, png, tiff, and wmf).
9. Convert Images to PDF Convert images (bmp, jpg, gif, png, tiff, and wmf) into a PDF file with layout options.
10. Convert PDF into images Save PDF pages into images (png, jpg, bmp and tiff) with DPI options.
11. PDF Form Fields: Delete, Flatten, List Delete, Flatten or List the PDF Form Fields inside a PDF file.
12. Convert PostScript(PS) File into PDF Convert PS file into PDF so that adobe reader can read it.
13. Add Information Add information (Title, Author,  Subject, Keywords, Created, Creator, Producer and Version) to the PDF document.
14. Free Scanner Scan your Paper Form or Photo into images (PNG, JPG, BMP, TIF and GIF) or PDF
15. Create Transparent Image Create a transparent image with options to adjust one Color and the left Colors' transparency.

I haven't had the need to use all of these tools, but the ones I have used have worked well. One way, for example, that I use them is to pull the Leader Sheets out from the PDF files of the Here We Stand Confirmation Curriculum. Then I e-mail just those two sheets to my small group leaders and they can have the chance to look them over before our class meets. I also extract and e-mail the Learner Take-Home sheets to each student's family, because I've found that my kids don't always remember to take them home. (I'm sure that none of you have ever run into that problem!)

The interface isn't always the easiest or prettiest, but this seems to be a pretty powerful set of PDF tools and I hope you find them helpful.

Blessed Advent,
Pastor Andy

As I have freely admitted before, I am a Google fan, and I think they get how the internet should be used in a way that I agree with. I am excited about the Android operating system that they have brought to mobile phones and how open that is. I look forward to having one of those phones myself, but I'm holding out to see if something better than the Droid comes around. It looks great, but there are some rumors I'm waiting on.

I have used, and still do use, Remember the Milk for much of my task management. It's a great product and I only scratch the surface of what it can do. I haven't gotten into using tags, locations, contacts, or many of the other features. I just add things to my list, often using Dial2Do, and then I take them off when they're finished. Or, sometimes I just leave them there forever, like my oldest task of setting up an annual physical which is over a year old, which sort of defeats the annual part! I also use the Remember the Milk for Gmail gadget and Firefox extension, available at http://www.rememberthemilk.com/services/gmail/, so that I can see my tasks from within my Gmail account.

Remember the Milk does also have some integration with Google Calendar, but I found it wasn't for me. I wanted something that would sit alongside my calendar and let me add things easily and have them show up both in the list and on the relevant calendar date. I also wanted to be able to modify the list from my iPod Touch, whether I had internet access or not. I could have paid for a pro membership to Remember the Milk in order to use their iPod Touch application, but I didn't feel I was using the service enough to justify paying for it.

Awhile back, Google came out with Google Tasks, a task manager of their own. It isn't nearly as robust as Remember the Milk, but it does much of what I was looking for. I've found myself using it more and more, even though it doesn't have Dial2Do integration, yet. (I have contacted Dial2Do and asked them to consider adding Google Tasks to their service.) I find that Google Tasks also works well for the check-off lists that we probably all use to keep track of things like who has paid for a retreat! I just create a new list and add the names of everyone who needs to pay. Then, when they pay, I check them off. I don't "clear completed items" until everyone has paid. If I need to make a note, I can leave the name as the "task" and add a note in the Notes field.

To access Google Tasks from Gmail, click on Tasks, which should be right under your Contacts. This pops up a Google Talk style window with your tasks listed in it. You can add notes and due dates by clicking on the ^> at the right hand of each item. If you click on the pop-out arrow, your task list will float in a new window.

To access it from Google Calendar, click on Tasks, which should be right under Quick Add. This will open a sidebar to the right of your calendar screen and it will have the same tasks in it as you see from any other method of accessing Google Tasks. Once you start using Google Tasks, you'll also notice a new calendar under My Calenders which is, appropriately enough, called Tasks. Selecting or un-selecting this will control whether or not your tasks are displayed on your calendars.

You can also add Google Tasks to your iGoogle page, if you use that, by adding the Tasks gadget. Or you can visit gmail.com/tasks from your mobile phone or iPod Touch and access your list that way.

Finally, I found an iPhone/iPod app called GeeTasks which lets me quickly add tasks to any of my lists whether or not I'm connected to the internet. There is a YouTube video explaining the application at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lXy5jY5lSUQ&feature=player_embedded. It's a $2.99 application, but that's close enough to free for me! There is always a chance that Google will change the API enough that the developer won't be able to keep it working, but it has worked well for me for a couple of months and there have been a couple of new versions that have improved the user experience.

Good luck with whatever you end up doing, and get rid of those sticky notes!

Justin Snider, our Mac geek, writes this week about his experience with Apple Safari on both the Mac and the PC.

I had my first experience with Safari on a PC when Internet Explorer was struggling to surf the Web.  A friend of mine said "Internet Explorer is so 90's!"  He told me how Safari had been released for PC, I installed it, and I was blown away by the speed, clean looking design, and power to load the most flash heavy sites.  Now that I have been using a Mac as my fulltime work computer, Safari 3.1 is the default web browser, but I spent months using Firefox as my default web browser, trying out different add-ons, loved the easily customizable interface, and the great toolbar search engines.  

A couple of months ago Safari 4 Beta (http://www.apple.com/safari/) was released to the public, and seeing the new speed tests versus other browsers, I downloaded, and it is now my default web browser once again.  Safari 4 Beta uses a screaming fast java script engine called, Nitro Engine, which places it 30 times faster than Internet Explorer 7, and 3 times faster than Firefox 3 (but a new, faster version of Firefox is under beta testing currently).  Safari also handles new types of web design well, scoring 100% in the Acid 3 Web Browser Test (you can try your own web browser at http://acid3.acidtests.org /).  Safari 4 Beta also has Top Sites, an optional homepage that visually displays thumbnails of your most visited sites, where you can also pin your favorite sites too.  There is also a new history window where you can visually thumb through sites you have visited using Cover Flow, like you can in iTunes and newer iPods.  

Though you can't install supported add-ons like Firefox can, I have installed a free ad-blocking program, AdBlock (http://burgersoftware.com/en/safariadblock ), that blocks most ads from loading on webpages, creating a clean, fast loading experience.  Like I said, Safari is very clean looking, short, text based menu bar, with tabs, address bar, predictive Google search bar, and a customizable bookmark bar.  Other options include instant "E-Mail Contents of This Page," private browsing (so if you are at someone else's computer, it won't remember your history or login items), built in RSS Reader, and a handy download menu to easily find and manage current and past downloads.  All these features look and work identical on both the Mac or Windows version.  

I recommend this browser, if you want a fast, clean looking, easy-to-use browser, that can handle any feature rich website.

Justin Snider is a full-time Director of Youth & Family Ministry at Gloria Dei Lutheran Church in Olympia, Washington.  He loves technology and had to choose between working in the tech industry or youth ministry, and certainly chose the right profession!  YouthDirector - at - GloriaDeiOlympia - dot - org

We're in the middle of exploring Internet browsers. The second most popular browser on the Internet, run by nearly one in four users, is Mozilla Firefox. It's the one that I run on a daily basis at work and at home and it's one I would encourage you to take a look at as an alternative to the base browser included with your system. One of the things I like aboutFirefox is that it is truly cross-platform, running on Microsoft Windows, Mac OS X, or a wide variety of Linux distributions localized in over 60 different languages. You can also download a version from PortableApps.com which will run directly from a USB Flash Drive.

Firefox is almost five years old, with version 1.0 having been released in November of 2004. The current version is 3.0.10 and was released on April 27, 2009. It is completely Open Source and 100% Organic. Firefox checks regularly for updates to itself and applies those automatically when you start the browser. These new releases are designed to patch security holes, fix bugs, and improve the browsing experience. You can see exactly what's been changed or fixed at http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/3.0.10/releasenotes/ .

The reason I run Firefox on a daily basis is that there are many ways I can customize the browser. I run a PC, but I think the Aqua user interface is really pretty. So I downloaded the iFox Smooth Theme and now it looks much like it's running on a Mac. Firefox lets you set your default search engine and then integrate that with the Google Toolbar so that I can search Google, Wikipedia, current news, or my Gmail account with one click. I also have a Facebook Toolbar for Firefox that keeps me notified of new messages, requests, and status updated in a compact interface. Then there is Download Statusbar, which replaces the download files interface in Firefox with one that lives just above the statusbar.

These add-ons are a wide variety of programs, available at http://addons.mozilla.org, that extend the functionality of the core browser and customize the browser experience. Firefox routinely checks for updates to add-ons and notifies you that they are available. On top of the toolbars that I mentioned above, I also run other add-ons that live in the status bar at the bottom of the screen. I use 4 site-watcher add-ons to monitor various deal-at-a-time websites, including Woot.com. I use one that links to Presdo.com for event scheduling. I have the Greasemonkey add-on installed, which enables all sorts of other scripts to work and I have IE Tab installed, which lets me render a page within Firefox using the Internet Explorer rendering engine. This is very helpful for those sites coded only to work on IE.

Finally, I have some add-ons that only help specific sites to work in an enhanced mode. These include Better GCal; Better Gmail 2; Better GReader; Remember the Milk for GMail, which lets me see my Remember the Milk tasks alongside my GMail messages; and DragDropUpload, which lets me drag and drop files onto GMail and other web pages.

There are literally thousands of other add-ons that can be used to customize Firefox. They'll do everything from control a media player to tell you the weather within the browser. If you've ever wondered if it were possible to do something, it is likely that someone else has wondered the same thing and wrote an add-on to make it possible. That's what I like about Firefox. It is community supported software that works well, runs fast, and has lots of features.

The majority of Internet users access the Internet using Windows Internet Explorer as their web browser. Depending on whose statistics you believe, between two out of every three and three out of every four people are using IE. The majority of those who use IE are using IE 7, with a fair amount still using IE 6 and the early adopters having moved over to IE 8. IE used to be available on Linux and Macintosh platforms, but now is Windows-only with a mobile version as well.

I think the biggest reason that folks use IE 7 is that it's easy. When you open your Windows-based computer up from its box, Internet Explorer is already installed. It's a part of Windows and it's ready to go. Windows/Microsoft Update keeps it up to date and it's installed on virtually every PC running Windows XP or later. It may very well not be the best, but it's familiar to many users and displays almost every website as it was intended to be displayed. Some website are indeed written especially for IE 7's quirks and therefore don't display perfectly in other browsers! IE 7 only gets a bad looking 12/100 on the Acid3 Browser Test, which is designed to measure how well a browser adheres to Web Standards.

IE 7 supports tabbed browsing, which means that you can have multiple web pages open within one browser window. I find these tabs to be annoyingly slow to open, but yourmileage may vary. It also supports toolbars which give you a variety of customizable buttons across the top of your window. Google Toolbar and Yahoo Toolbar are two popular bars that integrate with their respective sites and provide features such as bookmark synchronization across multiple browsers. ActiveX controls provide other functionality within the browser window.

I used IE for many years as my primary browser, largely because I figured it was already on my system and parts of it get loaded to run Windows anyways. But I couldn't shake the sneaking suspicion that it was getting slower and slower and bogging down my system when I used it. Soon after upgrading to IE 7, Iabandoned IE as my primary browser. I still use it occasionally, both on its own and within FireFox, but not nearly as much as I once did. I'll talk more about using IE within FireFox next week!

If you use IE, I'd suggest upgrading to at least IE 7. Microsoft is constantly releasing patches to prevent malicious users from exploiting vulnerabilities in the code. Even if you don't regularly use IE, I'd still suggest upgrading to IE 7 because IE code can also be used by other programs in their mini-browsers. Some developers make the assumption that all Windows systems have an up-to-date version of IE on them.

If you use IE and are sick of it, stay tuned. We'll be exploring some other alternatives in the coming weeks.

I have presented a variety of options to using Microsoft Office and, in some cases, other Microsoft products. Generally, Microsoft products are quite powerful, but they require a powerful computer to run them on and a powerful wallet to purchase them with. However, there is a way to legally acquire Microsoft and Adobe products for use at an ELCA congregation or related institution.

CDW (Computer Discount Warehouse) has been authorized by both companies to sell software to ELCA not-for-profit organizations with Section 501(c)(3) status. This program provides substantial savings by purchasing through their Nonprofit Licensing Programs. Our secretary recently received a gift from a member of the congregation and decided that she wanted to upgrade from Microsoft Office 2000 to something a bit newer. One boxed copy of Microsoft Office 2007 Small Business Edition at Amazon retails for $450 and you can get it for $240. There may be other offers available, but they're all quite expensive.

So I went to the CDW page at the ELCA Website and found the contact information for the ELCA representative at CDW, Geoff Carlson. You can reach him at 866-874-3596, by fax at 312-705-0613, or by e-mail at geofcar@cdw.com. Geoff sent me back a comparison sheet of the various versions of Office and the price through CDW. I could get Small Business Edition, which I needed because it includes Microsoft Publisher, for $66 per license. The Standard version of Office was $59 under the same program. You have to purchase five licenses to start with, either five for the same software, or for five different pieces of software, or any combination that adds up to five or greater.

I called Geoff and gave him the church credit card number and told him we wanted five licenses of Office SBE. A couple of days later, I got an e-mail with instructions to log on to a Microsoft Website. I entered my Windows Live ID and linked the Authorization Number and Agreement Number that Geoff had sent me to my account. Then I could see a list of Volume License Keys. I did some more clicking and downloaded the software right onto my computer. There is a download manager, so it resumes if something goes wrong, which is good since it's over 350MB! (If you don't want to download the software, you can purchase it on a CD for $25.) Once it downloaded, I extracted the files and installed Microsoft Office 2007 SBE onto our computers. I went back to the same website for the Volume License Keys, which were needed to complete the installation process.

So instead of one license of Office for $240, we got five for $330. That enough for everyone in our office and a spare computer that our boards and committees use. We could also purchase other products now, one license at a time, for the next two years. After two years, you have to re-up and purchase a five-license pack. By the way, the program is available for the Macintosh version of Office as well and I'm sure all of the Adobe products for Mac.

This is a great way to legally get software at a much better price than purchasing it off the shelf!

I hope to see some of you at the Extravaganza! You can Twitter me at adnyla.

I've been on vacation this week and our Mac guru, Justin Snider, sent me an offer to write a post. So here are some tips from him on how to use a Mac in a PC environment. -Pastor Andy

Often if two different operating systems are working to accomplish one goal, conflicts may arise. Here are some tips on how Macs can play nicely with PCs. My pastor and I have Macs, while the rest of our office staff have PCs with Windows XP and I often have to send documents, presentations, and other publications their way. Here are a few tips to convert and export things so that they are Windows friendly:  (Note: all these tips, except #5 are done in Mac OS 10.5)

1) Exporting Text Documents. If both computers are using Microsoft Office, you may not have encountered this problem, but I use the less expensive Apple iWork bundle of programs (Pages, Numbers, and Keynote), and the Pages format is not simply read by Microsoft Office, though Pages will open a Word document just fine, so here is how to convert a Pages document. In the File menu, click export, you have 4 options: PDF to create and exact copy of your document that may not be edited, Word to create a document that can be opened and edited by Microsoft Word, RTF (Rich Text Format) for word processing software other than Word (like Open Office), and Plain Text to be opened in any text editor but note that this option strips any formatting (fonts, colors, etc.) you may have done the document. After you have clicked your option, click Export, then it will give a prompt to choose a place to save, then you make attach it to an email or throw it on a USB disk. Note that this does not change your original file, but creates a new file in the new format.

2) Exporting a Keynote Presentation. Keynote is the cheaper Apple-based presentation software over PowerPoint, and will open a PowerPoint presentation with no problems, but occasionally I want to go the other way. Again, click File, Export for your options. There are lots of options here, but the most used way is exporting to PowerPoint format. Others include QuickTime Movie (using set timings), Flash, PDF, HTML, iPod, and Images.

3) Exporting iCal (and other documents) to PDF. Sometimes I like to send a certain month in iCal to others' emails, and though there is not a native export to PDF function like above, here is a simple way to accomplish it. Go to the month you want to start with (you can do more than one month) and click File, Print. Select the options you want shown like how many months you want, size of text, etc. then click continue. On the print menu instead of sending to a printer, on the bottom left there is a button marked PDF with an arrow. Click the arrow, and the options include view as PDF, save as PDF, even mail as PDF, where it opens an email with the PDF attached ready for you to insert your email addresses! This print to PDF works with other various programs in Mac OS 10.5, like Stickies, Mail, and any other program you can print in.

4) Export a Song or Recording in iTunes to MP3. Note: please only do this if you have rights to the song-making copies of protected media may be subject to federal laws. I use this process with recordings I make of worships services. Not everybody uses iTunes, and if you try to send a song or recording in iTunes format (AAC) or QuickTime format (.mov), some Windows users will not be able to hear it. Open iTunes and go to iTunes menu, Preferences. Click the Import Settings button under the General tab. Under the Import Using menu, go from using AAC Encoder to MP3 Encoder, click OK, OK to get out of the menus then navigate to the recording to convert. Click the song then go to the Advanced menu and click Create MP3 version. You can then drag the new file (that ends with .mp3) to the desktop, usb disk, email attachment, etc. This keeps your original sound file untouched. Remember to change the preferences back to AAC Encoder if you like to rip your Cd's in that format, otherwise subsequent recordings will be imported in MP3 format.

5) Creating PDF Documents in Windows For Free. Windows users can also have the capability to Print to PDF by installing a free program like PrimoPDF (www.primopdf.com). I use PrimoPDF on all my Windows computers and love how easy it is to use. After installing, PrimoPDF shows up as a printer in all your program's print menus. Simply select PrimoPDF as your printer and click Print and a PrimoPDF menu will appear. Choose a place to save the file and quality, and you have just exported your document into a PDF easily read by all!

Have fun playing nice!

Justin Snider
YouthDirector - at - GloriaDeiOlympia - dot - org
www.GloriaDeiYouth.or

A few weeks back I mentioned a way to use MOV files within PowerPoint by inserting them as an object and calling out to another program to play the video file. It was an imperfect solution and I really wasn't happy with it. I've been looking for a way to reliably convert MOV files into WMV files so that PowerPoint would let me use them within presentations. Finally, thanks to GeekBreek.TV with Cali Lewis #464, I've found it. FormatFactory handles all sorts of media format conversions on Windows.

According to the website, FormatFactory is a multifunctional media converter which handles all these conversions:

• All to MP4/3GP/MPG/AVI/WMV/FLV/SWF.
• All to MP3/WMA/MMF/AMR/OGG/M4A/WAV.
• All to JPG/BMP/PNG/TIF/ICO/....
• Rip DVD to video file , Rip Music CD to audio file.
• MP4 files support iPod/iPhone/PSP/BlackBerry format.

So, here are the steps to download a MOV file or an MP4 file that you want to use it within PowerPoint.

1. Install FormatFactory by downloading it from this link.
2. Save the file somewhere you can remember it. Let's use Brief #464 of GeekBrief.TV. Even though it is available in Windows Media format, let's usethis link to download it as an MP4 file. (Right click the link and choose Save As, then put it somewhere you can remember.)
3. Run FormatFactory.
4. In the left column, click All to WMV.
5. In the window that pops up, make sure the checkbox next to Output to source file folder is checked.
6. Click Add File under the big green plus sign.
7. Add the file or files that you want to convert and press the Open button.
8. Click the Okay button.
9. At the top of the window, click the Start button to start the conversion.
10. As it converts, you'll see a progress bar.
11. Once it's done, you should have a WMV file that you can play within PowerPoint by using the Insert-->Insert Movie-->Movie from File.

FormatFactory will also handle all sorts of other conversions, for example making video ready to play on an Ipod or Blackberry or other portable device that is picky about what formats it will play.