MICROSOFT DID SOMETHING TO COMPLICATE READING PDFs

Question

I received an email with a PDF.  I have acrobat pdf reader but when I tried to open the PDF I got a list of Microsoft products, Adobe was not even mentioned.

Bevi Chagnon - PubCom.com · Accepted Answer

Your version of Windows doesn't know which software program to open when it encounters the .PDF file extension.

Change that in the Windows Control Panel:

Select Default Apps
Select Choose default apps by file type
On the left, scroll down the list of file types to "PDF".
On the right, click to expose the drop-down menu and select Adobe Acrobat DC.

gary_sc · Answer

Hi Bill,

I'm a Mac user so I can't tell you what/how to do it but on the Mac, when a user opens a PDF, it is automatically opened by Apple's Preview app that can read PDFs (and a tad more). However, it is possible in the Mac interface to tell the Finder that when they encounter a PDF to open it up in Acrobat (or WHATEVER application you want it to open). I HAVE to belive that that capability is also there on a PC.

It no more surprises me the MS doesn't tell you about 3rd party options anymore than Apple doesn't tell you about those options either. Each OS has a whole list of built-in applications that do pretty much most of what you want. The quality of how well it does that is a whole different matter but that's a separate issue.

If you do not know how, I'm sure someone will pipe in here how to get Explorer to open PDFs in Acrobat, good luck!!!

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