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Author Topic: Adobe Acrobat zoom/navigation frustrations  (Read 3982 times)

tomos

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Adobe Acrobat zoom/navigation frustrations
« on: September 20, 2011, 10:05 AM »
I possibly should find a graphics forum but I lazy and hope someone here will know this:

There is a method of navigating/zooming which is used in some graphics programmes, also in Adobe Acrobat.
Some people say it's difficult to learn (it's mostly useful for graphics) but it is highly efficient, and a PIA when it doesnt work.

Here's a quick image of keys / combinations.

Zoom_Pan_Navigate.gif

[edit] mouse-click needed for zoom to work (incremental). Alternatively Click n Drag to select area to zoom into/out-of [/edit]

the beauty of it is that you can fluidly move between all these options by pressing or de-pressing one or more of the keys.

Ctrl = pointer
add Spacebar = Zoom in
add Alt = Zoom out
keep Spacebar pressed and release others = Pan/Hand

Long intro :)
this was broken in Acrobat 9 AFAIK (edit: I'm not sure now - it's possible I upgraded from 8 to 10)
They decided to spruce it up in version 10, which I hate, but could live with if it worked properly - but it doesnt (going from Ctrl+Space to just Space leaves you with Zoom in instead of Pan)

[1] Does anyone know if it works in Acrobat 8 (I cant remember)
[2] Wondering is it dangerous these days to use older versions of Actobat as default PDF opener (if so, I think can have two versions installed).
Tom
« Last Edit: September 20, 2011, 12:17 PM by tomos, Reason: forgot the mouse click :) »

Renegade

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Re: Adobe Acrobat zoom/navigation frustrations
« Reply #1 on: September 20, 2011, 10:11 AM »
I'm on Acrobat 9 Pro, and I use CTRL + +/- for zooming. Is that what you are looking for?
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tomos

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Re: Adobe Acrobat zoom/navigation frustrations
« Reply #2 on: September 20, 2011, 10:47 AM »
I'm on Acrobat 9 Pro, and I use CTRL + +/- for zooming. Is that what you are looking for?

Thanks Renegade, but no, that's not it - I'm looking for the method I described above (if you're not familiar with it, I think it's very difficult to explain it - it needs a "show me").

I'm trying to think of a metaphor but cant - I've been using this method for 11 years now, every workday, all through the day. When it's broken, it's very challenging. And really slows me down (so I come here and procrastinate lol) ...
Tom

Stoic Joker

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Re: Adobe Acrobat zoom/navigation frustrations
« Reply #3 on: September 20, 2011, 11:24 AM »
Wow! ...Broken is right. While I've never heard of that key combo, I do have Adobe Reader 9 installed. Ad when pressing Ctrl + Space the cursor changes to the little zooming + sign.
Pressing Ctrl + Space + Alt changes the cursor to the little zooming - sign.

But neither have any effect on the current document view.

Rather weird they'd break half of something ... because I use Ctrl + (numpad) 2 to force fit to window all the time.

IIRC Adobe is still doing security updates back to version 7 ... So you should be safe with 8 for a while.

If you run two different versions, the only catch I've seen is occasionally Outlook will hang because it trying to hand the file to both of them via the add-ons. But that's easy enough to fix by disabling one of them in Outlook.

tomos

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Re: Adobe Acrobat zoom/navigation frustrations
« Reply #4 on: September 20, 2011, 12:06 PM »
Wow! ...Broken is right. While I've never heard of that key combo, I do have Adobe Reader 9 installed. Ad when pressing Ctrl + Space the cursor changes to the little zooming + sign.
Pressing Ctrl + Space + Alt changes the cursor to the little zooming - sign.

But neither have any effect on the current document view.

:-[  a BIG OOUPs :-[
once the zoom sign shows, you need a mouse click to zoom in/out (which is done in increments).
[edit] mouse-click needed for zoom to work (incremental). Alternatively Click n Drag to select area to zoom into/out-of [/edit]

But for me it's when the transition from each setting to any other is broken is the problem.


IIRC Adobe is still doing security updates back to version 7 ... So you should be safe with 8 for a while.
I'll have a go at installing 7 if I can find it, & see how I get on.
[edit] Found it - nice site: http://www.oldapps.com/about.php [/edit]
Tom
« Last Edit: September 20, 2011, 12:20 PM by tomos, Reason: show edit from post #1 »

Stoic Joker

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Re: Adobe Acrobat zoom/navigation frustrations
« Reply #5 on: September 20, 2011, 02:38 PM »
Wow! ...Broken is right. While I've never heard of that key combo, I do have Adobe Reader 9 installed. Ad when pressing Ctrl + Space the cursor changes to the little zooming + sign.
Pressing Ctrl + Space + Alt changes the cursor to the little zooming - sign.

But neither have any effect on the current document view.

:-[  a BIG OOUPs :-[
once the zoom sign shows, you need a mouse click to zoom in/out (which is done in increments).
[edit] mouse-click needed for zoom to work (incremental). Alternatively Click n Drag to select area to zoom into/out-of [/edit]

But for me it's when the transition from each setting to any other is broken is the problem.


IIRC Adobe is still doing security updates back to version 7 ... So you should be safe with 8 for a while.
I'll have a go at installing 7 if I can find it, & see how I get on.
[edit] Found it - nice site: http://www.oldapps.com/about.php [/edit]


Oh.. Duh! (hehe) that does work. Damn those details... :) Ctrl + Scroll seems easier to me ... But I'm not used to the shortcut. I gotta install Adobe Reader on a new machine hear shortly, so I'll try it with the new version X.

Stoic Joker

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Re: Adobe Acrobat zoom/navigation frustrations
« Reply #6 on: September 20, 2011, 02:53 PM »
Well... I just tried it with Adobe Reader X and it seem to be working ... Or I'm doing it wrong *Shrug* (not sure)