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Subject:RE: ZIP efficiency and file size, Doc vs. PDF From:"Sean Brierley" <sbri -at- haestad -dot- com> To:"TECHWR-L" <techwr-l -at- lists -dot- raycomm -dot- com> Date:Fri, 16 Aug 2002 10:58:24 -0400
That's cool. I'd check into the way your PDFs are being created, though.
There might be some efficiencies you can introduce that make everything
easier. That is, some of the issues you have with PDF might be the
result of people using the Acrobat product incorrectly.
I'd also consider setting up an FTP site rather than relying on e-mail
for such interactions, especially if you are doing business with AOL
users--it seems like a good ISP for families but not for businesses.
As for the look of graphics in the PDF, I agree Word anti-aliases
better. But, is the point online viewing or is the point printing,
because in-print there should be no difference.
Sean followed up with:
> .... ZIP clearly compresses Word Doc files more than PDF files. But,
> the overall efficiency and resulting file size is pretty much a tie.
Your experience differs greatly from mine. Also, I am often dealing with
PDFs I did not create, such as company literature created by our
Marketing
department or by third-party ad agencies, or brochures and datasheets
from
partnering companies. Thus I do not have a hand in how well they were
crafted in terms of file size, graphic resolution, etc.
So when I'm given three PDFs, each over 1MB in size, and told to e-mail
them to somebody with an AOL address, I get nervous. And I know I'll
have
to send more than one ZIP file to accomplish the task.
<snip>
PDFs are okay, but I consider them high-maintenance. They often only
look
good at certain Zoom resolutions, whereas Word resizes itself much more
obligingly. So between the amount of work that goes into creating a
*good*
PDF, and their relative density in terms of their ZIPability, I prefer
to
deal with Word. As do many of the customers and prospective customers I
deal with.
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