Expert PDF has long been a popular alternative to the more expensive Adobe Acrobat as a PDF editing and conversion solution, and the new version 6.0 promises a number of powerful additions and improvements.

For the uninitiated, Expert PDF is, at heart, a virtual printer driver that allows any printable documents or files to be rebuilt as PDF files for distribution. This approach makes the software extremely versatile in its own right, and dedicated Office controls offer shortcuts and improved functionality for those using Microsoft's popular suite.

'Printed' documents are sent to the Creator package where you can add watermarks, apply up to 256-bit encryption, embed fonts and compress and downsize images. Completed PDFs can be previewed, saved or emailed directly to recipients and jobs can be saved to prepare for future print runs.

Aside from the printer driver that is integral to the operation of the software, the range of dedicated applications includes a PDF batch creator, editor, PDF to Word converter and watermark editor. The bulk of the suite's functionality comes from the PDF editor, which offers similar basic tools to Acrobat with text and image selection, text editing and the ability to add shapes and images. You can also highlight, underline or strikeout text and attach relevant files.

The biggest improvement to this application in version 6.0 is the ability to create forms using a combination of combo boxes, listboxes, radio buttons, tickboxes, textboxes and control buttons. These can be used to initiate or facilitate a range of actions such as opening web links, running javascript and form-filling. Fields can be customised by format category and validation rules and calculations can be run on contents, with custom triggers available to tie to specific actions.

Elsewhere in the suite is the PDF to Word converter that allows you to edit documents in Microsoft Word. This doesn't work quite as well as it is supposed to, however, since more complex documents involving both images and text often result in the source file being reflowed incorrectly. Text-based and text-heavy PDFs are more accurately converted but this drawback, along with the fact that the conversion format is actually rich-text (RTF) rather than DOC, is worth bearing in mind if this feature is a priority.

Finally a watermark editor allows you to combine text, images and shapes to create an overlay of selectable opacity to apply to PDFs, and a batch converter lets you add any number of documents and image files to a single PDF file or series of conversions.

Expert PDF 6.0 is now significantly more powerful thanks to the new PDF form creation tools and improvements such as support for the Bates Numbering index, Javascript conversion and improved hyperlink conversion through Office documents. Not all of the features work as well as they could, however, as some parts of the suite do still come across as overly basic. The lack of a context-sensitive right-click menu within Windows is a bit of a missed opportunity in terms of improving usability.

Generally, though, this is a very capable alternative to Adobe's software and, certainly from a consumer or small-business perspective, Expert PDF offers versatility and control over each side of the conversion and creation process. At a basic level it's easy to use and there are some handy additional features for advanced users to help improve the functionality and efficiency of documents.

Verdict
Expert PDF 6.0 is still significantly cheaper than both the full Acrobat software and similar alternatives but it has done a good job of maintaining parity by offering many of the same features, albeit in stripped-down form. For those who want to be able to create and edit PDF documents but don't require the full power of the official suite, this should prove to be a capable and easy to use alternative that makes it easy to achieve professional looking results.

Company: Avanquest

Tags: microsoftword adobe acrobat portable document format pdf to word rich text format microsoftoffice pdf document