Acrobat Reader - Directions for Extracting Text

Adobe Acrobat Reader Assistance
Directions on Extracting Text for Use in Other Programs
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Please print these directions and read the entire page before you begin.

Prerequisites for Extracting Text

Before you can extract text from an Acrobat document, several conditions must first be met:

1. You must have the free Adobe Reader installed on your computer.

2. You must have the pdf file from which you are going to extract the text saved on your computer. To do this, let's assume you have made a Performance Report query and the Acrobat document is being displayed in your web browser window.

3. Choose File > Save As from the menu bar at the top of the screen.

Note: In these directions, when an action to be performed by the user is listed as (for example) File > Save As, the user should select from the menu at the very top of the screen (the File menu) and drag down to the command listed after the greater than sign (the Save As command) and release the mouse button.

4. A dialog box will appear asking you where to save the file on your hard drive. Save it in a location and remember that location.

5. At this point you may choose to Quit your web browser.

6. Open the file from your hard drive you just saved. The Acrobat Reader should open and display the first page of the report.

7. You are now ready to follow one of the two methods listed below

How to Select and Copy Text in Acrobat Reader

You can select and copy text in from PDF files within Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Copying All Text in a File

Note: Don't try to open this .pdf file from your word processor. You need to RUN it by clicking on your Windows START button at the lower left of your screen, then clicking on BROWSE to find the file. Click on the file to put it in the RUN window, then click on RUN. (You also can open the file by double-clicking on the file name in Windows Explorer.) In either case, the Acrobat Reader will open the file and you may cut and paste the material you want from the file.

Copy the text of an entire PDF file using the Continuous - Facing Pages command and the Select Text tool:

1. Choose View > Continuous - Facing Pages. The pages will appear tiled.

2. Choose View > Zoom To.

3. Enter "12" in the Zoom To dialog box, then click OK. Thumbnails of the pages will appear.

4. Choose Tools > Select Text.

5. Drag from the beginning of the text in the document to the end of the text in the document. You'll know the text is "selected" when it is hilighted with a color (sometimes black).

6. Choose Edit > Copy. At this point the text you copied is saved in memory -- no additional files are created. However, the information will stay in memory only until you copy something else.

7. You can now open your favorite word processor or page layout program (such as Microsoft Word, Pages, or PageMaker) and paste the text. To paste the text, choose Edit > Paste.

Note: Some text formatting may not be retained.

Copying Text from Specific Pages

To select text in a PDF file and copy it to the clipboard or another program:

1. Open the PDF file in your Acrobat viewer and then click the text selection tool.

2. Select the text you want to copy.

To select the text in only one column of a multicolumn layout, hold down the Control key (Windows or UNIX) or Option key (Mac OS) while dragging.

To select all the text on the page(s) in view, even if only a portion of each is visible, choose Edit > Select All. If you're viewing the pages in either Continuous or Continuous - Facing Pages mode, this will select the text on all of the pages in view.

3. Choose Edit > Copy. At this point the text you copied is saved in memory -- no additional files are created. However, the information will stay in memory only until you copy something else.

Note: To view the text on the clipboard, choose Window > Show Clipboard (not required).

4. You can now open your favorite word processor or page layout program (such as Microsoft Word, ClarisWorks, or PageMaker) and paste the text. To paste the text, choose Edit > Paste.

Optional Note: In Windows 95, the Clipboard viewer is not installed by default; therefore, you cannot use the Show Clipboard command until you install it. To install the Clipboard Viewer, open the Add/Remove Programs Control Panel, then click the Windows Setup tab. Double-click Accessories, select Clipboard Viewer, and then click OK. Follow the on-screen instructions to complete installation.