REFERENCES IN A PDF DOCUMENT

[Jouko5FB5]

Dear community members,

My question:

Softwares available: Adobe Acrobat and PDF architect.

Operation: Let's suppose that I have a  PDF documet ( an eBook or a long scientific article with approximately 100-200 references at the end of this document). When using   Word text processing program and Adobe Acrobat it is easy to create   "links" between the references in the text and the footnotes at the end of the original document. Normally, in scientific writing, these footnotes give relevant information about the origin of the source (book, magazine or web. site), but nothing else - for example:

Book: Kawamura, S.: The  Process of  Sub-Cultural Propagation among japanese Macaques. In: Southwick (ed.), Primate Social Behavior. New York 1963 (van Nostrand).

Magazine: Christensen, K.,G. et al.: "Ageing Populations: The Challenges Ahead," Lancet 374, no. 9696 (October 3, 2009): 1196-1208.

If my original PDF document is now copied to an external USB memory and I have also copied all the references as separate PDF-files in  full length to the same USB memory, how is it possible to "jump" from a reference in  the original PFD documet ( my publication) to the corresponding PDF article (reference text) - so that the reader is able to read that reference in full length and then "jump" back to the original publication. Thereafter s/he should continue reading from that  point in the text s/he had left when checking the reference article ? How to do this operation inside the USB memory ( many separate PDF files) insted of doing that inside one PDF  file (one long PDF file including both the publication and reference PDF files). Is this kind of operation possible if you are using a CD-ROM disc insted of USB memory or memory card ? What is the easiest and most reasonabe way to do this operation so that it goes smoothly and quickly without any extra headache.

Your advice and support is appreciated !

[try67 · Accepted solution]

Yes, this is possible. You can do it using plain links in Acrobat. Use the Add Link tool to draw the link over the area where the reference appears in the original document, then select the "Go to a page view" command. Now a "floating" window should appear with a Set Link button. Open the file you want to link to and then click that button. The link will point to this file, in its relative position to the main one. This means that if you move both of them together to another folder, or a USB drive, or a CD-Rom, that link should still work. It will not work if you rename the target file or move it to a different folder, relatively to the main one, though.

If this is something that you need to do a lot then it can also be automated, for example using this (paid-for) tool I've created that allows you to use a list of search terms and add a link to all their instances with a pre-defined action, such as opening another file in a relative location (as well as many other things). You can find it here: http://try67.blogspot.com/2012/03/acrobat-create-custom-links-from-text.html