• Automate routine, multi-step tasks with new guided Actions that can be shared with coworkers.
• Change how users interact with content and its context with PDF Portfolios using new layouts, visual themes and color palettes.
• Microsoft SharePoint integration. Check-in, check-out PDF files for reviewing and editing shared documents.
• A streamlined process for large organizations to deploy, configure and manage updates and conform to ISO standards, including support for Microsoft SCCM and SCUP.
• Updated user interface: Display the most commonly used tools all in one pane.

Reader X will introduce support for PDF documents that contain a much wider range of content types, including drawings, email messages, spreadsheets, videos and other multimedia elements. It also has new collaboration features: Users can make notes and share feedback by marking up PDF documents using the Sticky Notes and Highlighter tools. Other new features in Reader will include:

• Choose reading mode to fit more content on the screen, or two-up mode to view page spreads.
• Directly access online services at Acrobat.com from within Reader X. Perform common tasks such as creating PDF files, securely sharing and storing documents and screen sharing.
• Availability on additional mobile platforms, with support added for Android, Windows Phone 7 and BlackBerry Tablet OS.

Acrobat X is available to pre-order now; Reader X will be made available for download next month.

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In my view, we all need a web conferencing platform with a light footprint that enables us to hop in and out of web conferences with ease, without having to fire up a complex client to initiate the session. Acrobat Connect Pro could certainly find a home in browser tab where it could be waiting, ready for you to jump into a new web conference.

Acrobat Connect Pro 7.5 includes the following new features:

Integrated Audio. Flexible audio integration is a must have in a web conferencing platform. Take a look at your own project team; it’s doubtful that every team member is using the same phone system. Acrobat Connect Pro’s integrated audio (which was recently covered by Simon) adds an important communications layer to this web conferencing platform, and means that it can support VoIP, landline and mobile telephones as well as a range of traditional teleconferencing systems. If needed, you can even have conference attendees in the web conference using their PC’s mic and speakers.

Native PDF Support. If you and your team use Adobe Acrobat PDFs as a standard working format then you should know that this version includes PDF support, with improved workflow and Adobe Acrobat integration. PDFs offer a secure publishing format especially if you, your team, and clients are having issues with document corruption, incompatibility and other problems that can sometimes ensue with passing Microsoft Office documents around via email.

Additionally, there are refinements to Acrobat Connect Pro’s secure desktop sharing and interface with whitelisting and more granular security controls, which could open up the prospect of secure desktop sharing to organizations that may have been wary of it in the past.

Acrobat Connect Pro Goes Mobile

This latest version of Acrobat Connect Pro is also promising an iPhone client to enable iPhone users to attend web conferences on the go. Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to test this feature out as yet.

This latest release of Adobe Acrobat Connect Pro is definitely worth a look if you’re seeking a flexible web conferencing system for your project team.

Have you used Acrobat Connect Pro for web conferencing? Share your experience below.

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Here are some tips to help better manage document reviews at a distance:

Establish review guidelines. Truth be told, many organizations don’t know how to review and approve a document. As such, it is important to set out how you want your reviewers to check over each document. Your review guidelines should:

• Instruct the reviewers to follow procedures step-by-step. Tell them to point out incorrect steps and identify why the step is in error.
• Encourage the reviewers to look for better ways to present data, or identify if a different function or listing that would work better in the same situation.
• Instruct reviewers to check to see if the artwork (listings, figures, illustrations, tables) corresponds with the references in the text.
• Tell the reviewers to test  each line of program code and describe any problems.

Designate document stakeholders. Have a designated document stakeholder check over the document(s) undergoing review to help set review priorities and free up resources to ensure the document review happens on deadline. The stakeholders can also tie the document review into the overall project plan, if needed.

Identify primary and backup reviewers. This is a commonsense first step when project teams span multiple time zones, and even continents. If the primary reviewer is unavailable to resolve a question, then the team can always go to the backup reviewer.

Set a realistic review schedule. It is rare that a stressed and harried project team can make a full document review in just one pass. So depending on your project schedule, take the initiative to manage expectations and set a review schedule that ensures reviewers are going to add value to the documents they are reviewing.

Use online collaboration and version control. WebWorkerDaily regularly covers the latest in collaboration tools. Using one of these tools can help you better manage the review process with your team.

Use electronic document review tools. With Microsoft Word and Adobe Acrobat you can mark up and comment on electronic documents just as you can with pen and ink on a hardcopy document — there’s no need to fax documents any more. If your team is reviewing an XML-based document, look towards a solution like LiveTechDocs (I reviewed it for WWD).

LiveTechDocs Application

How do you manage document reviews?

Image credit: svilen001 from sxc.hu.

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Adobe Acrobat includes a number of electronic review tools. In this post, I’m going to show how you can use them to make online editorial comments.  While this post was based on Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro Extended, many of these review tools can also be found in Adobe Acrobat going back a couple of versions. Note that these tools are only available in the full version of Adobe Acrobat, not Acrobat Reader.

Comment & Markup Tools

Acrobat’s Comment & Markup tools offer a number of powerful tools for marking up PDF documents. Adobe has done a good job on the usability of these tools by including using many analogues of traditional paper-based review tools.

Comment & Markup Toolbar. You can think of the tools present on this toolbar as a substitute for a pencil, sticky notes and a highlighter. Launch the Comment & Markup toolbar by choosing it from the “Comments” menu. This toolbar includes Sticky Notes, the Text Editing tool (new in Acrobat 9), the Stamp menu (analogous to print stamps of old), the Text Highlighter, a Callout tool for drawing attention to graphics and text, and there also a number of shape tools for drawing arrows and other shapes.

Comment Menu. The Comment menu includes options for comment display. You can also choose “Attach for Email Review” to send the PDF out to other team members via email, or “Send for Shared Review,” which uses Acrobat.com or a corporate server for hosting shared document reviews.

Text Edits and Acrobat PDFs. The PDF format had gained a reputation for document security because users could not modify text — especially useful for important documents like contracts and invoices — but with Acrobat 9, you can make text edits to PDFs, including inserting, deleting and replacing text. However, the text editing tools in Adobe Acrobat aren’t as robust as those in, say, Microsoft Word, and are only really useful for making very minor edits.

Review Approvals. Depending on the formality of your project team, there should be some sort of review signoff. While you can take the easy road with a simple email signoff, recent versions of Adobe Acrobat include an electronic signature feature that you can use for this purpose. In Acrobat 9, choose “Sign,” and then “Sign Document.” A dialog box appears. Click “Sign” and follow the prompts that appear.

Manage the Document Review

Before embarking on your first Adobe Acrobat-based document review with your team, I recommend the following:

• Ensure that all team members have a full license for Adobe Acrobat. The review tools in this post are only available in the full version of Acrobat, not in Acrobat Reader.
• Discuss the need for standardization of how all the team members will use the review and comment tools (if you already use a standardized markup, it should be fairly easy to transfer this to a PDF review system).
• Document any standard document review procedures as an aid for reviewers, especially those who aren’t frequent Adobe Acrobat users. The procedure should have a provision for final document approval by the reviewer, whether by electronic signature or by email approval.
• Make the review process accessible to the team for future reference.

Do you use Acrobat for document reviews? Share your tips in the comments.

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Adobe is adding to options for working in the cloud with Acrobat.com. About a year ago, Acrobat.com went online, competing with Google Docs and Zoho with word processing, collaboration options and tools to work with PDFs. Since then, Adobe had also added Presentations to the mix.

The news at Acrobat.com is twofold. First of all, Adobe has added a new spreadsheet tool, bringing its suite of online tools in line with those offered by Google and making it far more useful to a web worker who wants to handle all of the basic office file types in the cloud. Second, Adobe has announced that Acrobat.com is leaving beta, which, in turn, has led to the announcement that business subscriptions for these tools are going live.

The new developments at Acrobat.com make for some changes that actually appeal to anyone who works online for a living. Google Docs has been a long-time favorite for managing personal files or even handling certain projects, but it has some shortfalls when it comes to managing business files over the long term. Even the simple ability to save a PDF can make a big difference for users that handle the majority of their daily work online. But Adobe will be taking the usefulness of its online tools a step further. It has already announced plans to launch a desktop AIR application that unifies its online tools and offers a way to work offline — and you’ll be able to share workspaces through the application. All these developments make it clear that Adobe is targeting professional web workers far more than Google Docs does.

While Acrobat.com is adding paid subscriptions to the site, there will still be free accounts available. The subscription choices — Basic for $14.99, and Plus for $39 — primarily offer the opportunity to share web meetings with more participants and other collaboration options, and offer more support. Proper support can make Acrobat.com’s tools more appealing to many businesses than its competitors. While Google Apps remains an alternative, tools like the desktop application may be more than enough to lead some users to make the switch.

The interfaces for each of Acrobat.com’s tools could be enough to convince a person to switch all on their own. The simple fact is that most online applications have interfaces that mimic their offline counterparts to some extent. More than a few word processing options have a definite similarity to Microsoft Word, for example. Acrobat.com’s options, however, offer interfaces that appeal to users that have long since tired of that appearance. The interface for Presentations, for instance, is slick and intuitive — there is a learning curve when you make the switch from another application, but it’s fairly shallow. It’s almost as if Adobe created Presentations with a few of its other users in mind, like those already using the company’s design software.

Acrobat.com reports that it already has 5 million accounts registered, and is picking up 100,000 users each week. With Adobe’s focus on professional users already working online, it’s likely that number will continue to grow. The tools offered on Acrobat.com are sturdy enough for business use, with an interface that is enjoyable to use.

Do you use Acrobat.com? Let us know your thoughts on the service in the comments.

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A buffer overflow exploit has been discovered that could render your computer vulnerable to attack; a malicious party could potentially use the exploit to take control of your machine. All versions of Acrobat and Reader from 7 onwards on all platforms are vulnerable to attack.  Patches to these products will not be available until March 11th. Until Adobe issue an update, it may be advisable to switch to an alternative PDF reader (Foxit works well for Windows), and, as always, it would be a good idea to make sure that your antivirus software is up-to-date and exercise extreme caution when opening files from untrusted sources.

(via DownloadSquad)

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I can’t help it. I think they’re funny. And judging by their spanking new multisketch deal, so do the folks at Iklipz.

Sure, those with delicate sensibilities might want to start with the Fine Brothers’ hi-larious Lost parody series, and their breathless, single-take 100 Movie Spoilers in Five Minutes (the springboard for a recent NTVS Station Conversation). And those seeing a middle ground between the safe and the envelope-pushing might enjoy The Burger King, which involves a special bird-flipping rendition of the Safety Dance. But for true, no-holds-barred, Fine Brothers style, you can’t go wrong with their first sketch for Iklipz, the holiday treasure What is Eggnog?

I’m not going to spoil the surprise and tell you what the eggnog is. Let’s just say it’s something that, if you always hated eggnog, you’ll find hilarious. If you always liked eggnog, well, you’re probably not going to anymore. Sorry. (Sigh.) And you might not want to watch this at work, even if we are linking to the censored version.

The matchup is a smart one. The Fine Brothers — former Orthodox Jews, sons of a rabbi, and crazy, funny guys who have been unleashing all matter of hilarious hell on the Internet for the last four years — have a huge following and an unmistakably original creative style. Iklipz, a showcase for independent film with an advisory board made of film festival bigwigs and execs from some of Hollywood’s most prestigious companies, is actively seeking to build its comedy component and become a competitor with sites like Funny or Die. Hand, meet glove.

In addition to the Iklipz deal, the Fine Brothers also have a second season of their Lost laffer premiering on JustforLaughs in January, and something they promise is a “high concept” series debuting on Atom later next year. So the good times, gross and otherwise, aren’t going to let up anytime soon.

I just hope they don’t ruin any more of my favorite foods for me along the way. (Farewell, eggnog. Sniff.)

This review, along with more details about the show, can be found at NewTeeVee Station.

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Adobe introduced their Creative Suite 4 (CS4) product family to the world today, almost sixteen months since the announcement of Creative Suite 3. With six editions to choose from, ranging in price from $999 to $2,499 (upgrades from $399 to $899), and thirteen standalone applications costing $199 to $999, it’s important that you have an understanding of your needs when reviewing the new features that make up each package. Adobe plans on releasing CS4 sometime in October.

Design Leads The Pack

Adobe has positioned InDesign as one of its flagship products and has added (or significantly enhanced) over ten major new features including:

• live prefight so you have instant feedback on potential problems prior to production
• easier ways to organize your workflow with a document links panel that provides a wealth of information on all your components
• the ability to tailor output via conditional text that auto-reflows based on conditions you set (without the use of layers) and even better control of how content reflows in general
• cross reference tools which allow you to dynamically update content across an entire document,
• full document export to XFL (Adobe Flash CS4) and interactive document design features with output to SWF, opening up many more uses for your creative work
• slick, new & customizable page transitions with options for PDF or SWF output
• dynamic guide placement and spread rotation tools which enable pinpoint placement and review of content

Not to be outdone, Photoshop has some significant enhancements of its own to tout, including:

• Two new panels enabling much better control over element adjustments and control over masks (pixel or vector-based)
• smoother panning and zooming when moving across an image
• distortion free (and fast!) canvas rotation
• content-aware scaling which effortlessly adjusts all image components
• improved depth-of-field control, color correction and image blending features
• better control over layers with the ability to auto-align and create panoramic views
• enhanced integration into Adobe Bridge
• improvements to workflow with tabbed or n-up multi-document views

Photoshop Extended includes significant 3D capabilities, including the ability to paint directly on 3D models or auto-wrap 2D content onto a 3D surface. Photoshop Extended also includes support for Flash-based panels that can customize virtually any portion of the image.

Illustrator catches some developer love with:

• multiple artboards (up to 100) in a single document with the ability to selectively save, export or print independently
• fine-tuned opacity control for gradients along with direct on-screen control of most gradient features with immediate feedback
• a new “blob brush” tool which generates a single clean vector shape
• full preview of print separations, helping create a “no surprises” situation when production time comes
• immediate feedback on all object customizations via the new Appearance panel

Heavy Lifters Bring Up The Middle

I use or publish PDF documents almost daily and Adobe delivers some interesting features in Acrobat 9 Pro:

• PDF Portfolio creation, which allow you to assemble all document components into a fully customizable single, dynamic PDF document
• the abiliy to embed Flash content directly into your PDF files
• compare documents (PDF, Word, PowerPoint, CAD and scans) and easily see differences in mutliple views
• significantly enhanced form building, management, deployment and analysis
• detailed preview of overprint characteristics and full preflight management (including the ability to correct problems right in Acrobat)
• seamless collaboration via features on acrobat.com
• faster launches and quicker minor edits

Flash receives a major feature uplift and finds itself easily incorporated into most CS4 products with little-to-no effort. It also gains some impressive new capabilities, including:

• object-based (vs. keyframe) animation with dirt-simple Bezier-control handles
• full 3D transformations of 2D objects
• a new “Bones” tool enabling quick creation of “inverse kinematic” (chain-like) animation and a full-featured motion editor for all components
• deco and spray brush tools which effortlessly turn symbols into design tools
• many pre-built animations to help jump-start your creative workflow
• full metadata, XFL & H.264
• the ability to publish to an AIR runtime

Untangling The Web

Adobe didn’t forget their web developer fans and has kicked up the feature sets of their three world-wide weavers. Dreamweaver starts off with a completely redesigned user interface and continues with:

• live preview mode
• AJAX & JavaScript code-hinting along with CSS best-practices context
• New code and file navigator with subversion support
• support for table-based HTML data sets
• Photoshop “Smart Object” support, allowing you to place PSD files that render source modifications automatically
• pre-release support for Adobe’s forthcoming InContext online editing service which allows end-users to modify your output without the need to purchase Dreamweaver
• the ability to publish to an AIR runtime

Fireworks fans see some sparks as well, including:

• Much improved user-interface
• Adobe AIR prototyping
• PDF export ability
• CSS-based layout export function
• Better asset management, styles manipulation, type-handling and color management
• significant performance improvements
• better team workflow management through integration with Adobe’s ConnectNow service

Contribute gains some impressive features of its own as well:

• Full support for dynamic workflows with approvals and in-context review panels
• In-browser editing (Firefox & IE only)
• Support for many blogging platforms, including MovableTyle, TypePad & WordPress
• Improved Dreamweaver integration, enhanced CSS support and a new auto-save feature to help secure your personal workflow

Keeping Things In Motion

If you have to keep things moving, then AfterEffects has some new tools to help, including support for the new 3D Photoshop layers as well as:

• fully searchable timelines and XFL composition export control
• powerful keyframe control enhancements
• integrated support for mobile-device content generation
• new cartoon effect
• integration of Mocha’s 2.5D planar tracking application
• tagged assets with XMP metadata and tight linking between Premier & Soundbooth

Premiere introduces full metadata tagging of all stages of your workflow production and:

• searchable audio via text-based, timecode-accurate metadata
• background batch encoding
• tapeless camera support without the need for transcoding or rewrapping
• over fifty editing tweaks requested by users
• better workflow and integration with other members of the CS4 suite and the ability to export projects to SWF
• Blu-ray Disc authoring (Encore
• includes OnLocation

You can’t improve the video without paying some attention to audio and Adobe has turned up the volume on Soundbooth with some new and improved features, including:

• Multitrack support (finally!)
• ASND support along with MP3 compression preview support
• speech search (shared feature with Premiere)
• automatic volume correction with volume keyframing tools
• significant enhancements to looping tools

Bringing It All Together

When you purchase the bundles, Adobe Bridge manages all of your media across all the packages while Device Central lets you tailor output to your desired audience with just a few clicks. The video-oriented toolsets can take advantage of Dynamic Link to speed up rendering and all your collaborative projects can integrate with Version Cue to greatly enhance workflow amongst your entire team.

Adobe plans on shipping all CS4 products in this October.

Are you excited about CS4? What feature are you most excited about? Let your voice be heard by dropping a note in the comments. (Beautiful icons by Adam Betts)

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When you create a YouSendIt account (1GB of monthly download and 100MB file size comes for free; $10 per month will get you substantially higher limits), you get access to a variety of YouSendIt applications. These applications allow you to work directly from your desktop or from other software. For example, YouSendIt Express sits on your desktop (OS X or Windows, while the YouSendIt Outlook application is implemented as a Microsoft Outlook add-in.

The latest release in this group of applications is YouSendIt for Acrobat Pro. After installing this on my Mac, “Send by YouSendIt” appeared on the File menu, right next to “Attach to Email”. Using this is as simple as filling in the recipient’s email address, along with a message; the current file is already selected. Using YouSendIt this way is literally as simple as using email for the file transfer, with the added benefit of handling huge files (as well as access to YouSendIt’s other features, such as delivery tracking and return receipts). The recipient gets a link in their email that they can click to download the file, just as you would if you shared it directly via YouSendIt’s web site.

The more of these integrations YouSendIt presents, the easier it becomes to use – and the more likely web workers will choose it instead of email. Other available integration options include Aperture, iPhoto, Photoshop, CorelDRAW, and (in beta) Microsoft Office for Windows.

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Starbucks Expands Pick of the Week to Music Videos; coffee chain to offer free music vids via iTunes. (MarketWatch)

Channel Frederator Award Nominees Announced; vote for your favorite Flash, CG or Funniest vid. (Channel Frederator)

Networks Say A La Carte Cable Would be “Devastating”; MTVN, Turner and Disney among those that sent a letter to FCC Chair Kevin Martin imploring him to drop this particular endeavor. (Multichannel News)

MSN Money Gets on the Money Track; segments from the PBS show to run on finance site. (MediaWeek)

Juno DVD and Download Released on Same Day; hit indie film available in both formats as of yesterday. DVD includes digital copy of the film. (TWICE)

Tremor Media Launches New Ad Platform; Acudeo lets advertisers schedule and consolidate delivery of in-stream video and overlay ads into one central console. (release)

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