hyperlinks from MS Word not working in PDF

It is just never ending and I wish someone at Adobe Actually looked into this because it is driving me absolutely nuts! 5 years people! 5 Effin Years!!! 

By @mayo001

Oh, you need more than Adobe to look into this! Microsoft is a huge part of the problem, too. And Apple, as well, especially for those trying to make PDFs from Office on Mac OS.

[Warning: this post has details so it's long.]

Trying to get these billion-dollar corporate behemoths (trillion-dollar behemoth for Apple) to coordinate their programs is worse than herding cats because they all have their own financial interests and investor-dominated boards to deal with. In one way or another, they are all competitors.

There is no reason why they should coordinate their programs — or even abide by the PDF standards (defined by ISO 32000 and available to any company that wants to make software that either creates PDF files or processes PDF files).

By "process," I mean that the software can open, read, interact with, and provide functionality for us users. The hyperlinks problem in this thread is an excellent example of these programs either not making the hyperlink correctly or not processing them correctly for the end user to click.

Microsoft, Apple, and other companies don't often make fully standards-compliant PDF files from their software, nor do they fully process PDF files. They'll do fine on some items and fail on others. There is no law that requires them to follow the PDF ISO 32000 standards. Following a standard is voluntary.

The only reason why these companies would invest money into proper programming is to make you, me, and other customers happy.

And honestly, how likely are they to do that!  Investors want to invest the least amount of money in a company, spend the least amount on programming the minimum functionality needed to sell the product, and then take out as much money as possible.

But we users can still vote with our wallets.

Oh, and at https://acrobat.uservoice.com/

Some suggestions to help ameliorate the problems:

(Note: I used "ameliorate" not "correct" or "fix." These are intended to help make a lousy situation a bit better. Maybe. Sometimes.)

• Note re: updates of software. Any changes to Microsoft programs, Adobe Acrobat and PDF Maker, or your operating system can affect how well a solution works. Might work today, but next week after an update, it might not. Just a warning...
• The most compliant-making software is by Adobe because they invented the PDF file format 30+ years ago and are part of an international committee that maintains the PDF ISO 32000 standard. Although Adobe is highly committed to doing PDFs "right," they do botch it now and then. Beware of updates of Acrobat and Creative Suite and always test new software before depending on it for your livelihood.
  
  • Exports from MS Office — use Adobe PDF Maker or File / Save As Adobe PDF. Make sure you check all options/settings that are appropriate for your needs. There are no magic wands: check your options 100% of the time.
  • Exports from Adobe InDesign and other Adobe programs — use the File / Export or File / Save As utilities in those programs. This works for both Windows and Mac versions of Creative Suite.
• Microsoft's built-in PDF export utility is available in MS Office programs (Windows only). It's fairly decent, but is known to develop some bugs after updates.
• Exporting PDFs from MS Office (Mac) is a nightmare. I'm told by engineers it's a problem with Apple's control of the OS. Try using Adobe's online PDF-making service (upload the source file and then retrieve the PDF), but that doesn't work well for accessible PDFs and forms. Try some of the vendors listed below who have PDF-making software for Macs. And it might be easier to just give up the Mac for this part of your work, and go with Windows. (I know...as a former Apple dealer, that statement makes me a heretic. But I have to get work done!)
• File / Print to a virtual printer creates a dead file that usually can't be machine readable (for accessibility software), edited, or with any interactivity like clickable hyperlinks. It's the worst way to make a PDF: find another way!
• The PDF file format (not Acrobat software, just the file format itself) is in the public domain, so any coder can write software that creates PDF files. The problem is how well the coder adheres to the ISO 32000 PDF standard! So try some different PDF manufacturers. Here's a decent list: https://sourceforge.net/software/pdf/  Our shop has used the following brands with varying degrees of success: FoxIt, Nitro, ABBYY FineReader,  WinZip PDF Pro, and Kofax Power PDF meet, more or less, the ISO 32000 standards. We have no experience with the others on the list.
• No one solution fits everyone. It all depends on what you need in the PDF, like accessibility features, clickable hyperlinks, color fidelity, usable forms, digital signatures, etc.
• PDFs for press/professional printing must be usable by the print shop's prepress and press equipment, and usually require conformance to the PDF/X standard for printing and graphic arts. Only Adobe's products make that kind of PDF, unless you have other industry software. If you do, you're not likely to be reading this thread because you're in a different universe! <grin>
• Any solution that works today might be broken tomorrow. Just a warning about those updates by everyone.

—Bevi

Disclaimer: I'm just a volunteer here on this user-to-user forum. Not an Adobe employee and don't receive compensation from Adobe, Apple, Microsoft, or any of the other companies listed. That means whatever you choose will make no difference to my retirement fund.

I do have quite a lot of experience in PDFs because I was on the original brainstorming team that came up with the concept of a "portable" file format in the late 1980s for Adobe (no money or patents 😞  ). I've been a beta tester for Adobe, Microsoft, and many other companies since then, and have taught / consulted with countless humans on making and using PDFs, probably well over a million by now. I'm a US Delegate to the ISO committees for PDFs and PDF/UA standards.

And I still don't know everything about PDFs!

Yes, that fixed the links - thanks. However, there is no option of saving images without downsampling them so I can't use this method. Anyway, I solved the problem (see previous post) but I don't understand why it was solved.

When you "Print to PDF", whether that's to the Adobe Acrobat Printer or some other manufacturer's virtual printer,  you'll loose most, if not all, of your interactive features like functioning hyperlinks. So it's not the best method to use.

File / Save As / PDF  uses a Microsoft converter that is built into MS Word. It is not an Adobe product. But you can control some of the properties in the final PDF by selecting the Standard (publishing online and printing) option before saving the files. This gives sufficient resolution of graphics for office printing (but not commercial printing presses).

To get a high-resolution PDF that also has full interactive functions, you'll need to use Adobe's PDF Maker plug-in, which is installed in MS Word when Acrobat Pro or Standard is installed.

If PDF Maker is installed, you'll have a Ribbon tab in Word labeled Acrobat. On the ribbon, select the Preferences icon to control how the PDF is made, including resolution.

Start by selecting one of the pre-sets from Conversion Settings drop-down menu, you'll have more control over color, image resolution, fonts, and more. Consider Press Quality, or PDF/X-3 for better quality at commerical print shops. And check the option to Add Links.

If you need even more control, click the Advanced Settings button, which takes you to the custom settings dialogue section. Change whatever you need to change, such as the resolution settings for graphics shown below.

When done, you'll need to Save the settings, and they will then be available from the first drop-down menu for future use. Very handy if you do this regularly.

Hope this helps.