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Submitted ⁨⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago⁩ by ⁨GreenDust@lemmings.world⁩ to ⁨[deleted]⁩

https://lemmings.world/pictrs/image/bd5f4030-8c94-4c31-a94b-53703763cbe0.jpeg

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  • Sanctus@anarchist.nexus ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    You’re not lying. You are printing it as a PDF. Your electronic buddy doesn’t see a difference.

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    • SnotFlickerman@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Beyond that, also, what’s so hard about clicking on “Export As… > PDF” which is literally in the file menu on LibreOffice at the very least. I don’t know about MS Office, but I would assume it’s the same.

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      • Zwiebel@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        It can produce different results than print to pdf unfortunately

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      • Railcar8095@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        I’m going to assume you’re on the younger side. That’s a relatively recent thing. For many many years we had to install PDF printers.

        Also the PDF printer is generic, but the export has to implemented for each application individually.

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      • Korne127@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Well, but we’re not just talking about Office. What about browsers, document viewers, etc.

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      • unknown1234_5@kbin.earth ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        oop probably meant from websites

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    • TheRealKuni@piefed.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Kids today don’t realize how much “printing” to files your computer does.

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      • mech@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Just tell them it’s like the Share button on their phone.

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      • BCsven@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Heh, we were doing some cosigner banking and I asks my one adult kid to send me the bank documents needed (they were pdf files on their computer). They sent me low res screen shots. Lol

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    • rainwall@piefed.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      This is as much linguistic tomfoolery for humans as it is a con for computers.

      I dont know the history, but the most likely case is some microsoft engineer implemented the “print as pdf” option to get around an adobe restriction in the far past, and now we have this weird convention where you “print” to only 1 filetype to “save” it.

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      • someguy3@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Someone else pointed out that printing to pdf was a universal solution no matter the program. Instead of each program having to make their own export option.

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    • anomnom@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Postscript (not the P in PDF, even though I think it should have been) is how Portable Document Format is made.

      PostScript’s original purpose was for formatting documents to print with laser printers, but to also interpret font hinting and display features for lower resolution printing. But it required printers to process them before rasterization.

      It was so good at this that it made sense to also use it for the much lower resolution of computer screens once computers were powerful enough to do the rasterization themselves. Hence the PDF replacing most .PS (PostScript) files, unless you were a graphic design student in the late 90s.

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      • ThunderQueen@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Oh boy, here i go learning again

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    • tomiant@piefed.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      When you are saving it as a .txt file, you are printing it as a .txt file, the computer sees no difference.

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      • Sanctus@anarchist.nexus ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Not how printing as pdf works but I appreciate the effort

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      • jaybone@lemmy.zip ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        I haven’t looked at the printer driver interface on various different operating systens, but I imagine programmatically you don’t write ACSII text directly to it, the way you would with file io calls. Though on Linux you have “lpr” where you can pipe text directly to the command. It’s possible a printer could natively support this, but clearly it would be a different interface to render anything more complex than ascii text.

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    • Zwiebel@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Err you are handing the file off to a pdf converter programm that acts like a print driver. So yes you are lying to your text programm

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      • lime@feddit.nu ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        pdf is a container format for code parsed by printers. there are no lies, just a virtual printer.

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  • TrickDacy@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Until you realize that a PDF is literally just a format based around a standard set of instructions used to print documents.

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    • tomiant@piefed.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      It stands for Print Da File.

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      • ivanafterall@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Print Deeznuts Fuckyou

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      • ramjambamalam@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Reminds me of Arnold’s guide to tar:

        Image

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      • rmuk@feddit.uk ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Potable Document Format. Retains formatting and safe to consume.

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      • AnarchistArtificer@slrpnk.net ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Next time someone asks me what PDF stands for, this is what I will tell them

        (I’m reflecting on how many times I’ve been asked what PDF stands for, because my comment would suggest it is a thing that happens often.

        Doofensmirtz_meme.jpeg: “if I had a nickel for every time someone asked me what PDF stood for, I’d have two nickels. — which isn’t much, but it’s weird that it happened twice”

        I think I’m just most people’s token techy friend. Or more specifically, I’m the techy friend who also knows loads of random shit and really enjoys answering random questions)

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      • someguy3@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Enhance. Enhance. Enhance…

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    • Bishma@discuss.tchncs.de ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Yeah, if you print to a printer what you’re most often doing is saving it as an Adobe PostScript file and sending that to the printer. PDF is similar, just with extra bells and whistles.

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      • SlurpingPus@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        It was like that back in the eighties, until the manufacturers decided to save on the chips by moving functionality into the drivers. Which was basically the start of everyone’s problems with printers.

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      • Hawke@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Im not so sure. I bet more than half of the drivers out there produce PCL output, and there are a lot of printers that use other languages too like ZPL and a myriad of others.

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      • Limerance@piefed.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Apple‘s AirPrint standard for wireless printing is pretty much sending a PDF over IPP.

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    • anton@lemmy.blahaj.zone ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      To be fair, they added stuff to it, like selectable text on a scanned page.

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      • TrickDacy@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Right, as another user said, it’s similar to postscript but with bells and whistles.

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  • InFerNo@lemmy.ml ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    “Print to file” to create a PDF, but it’s Microsoft’s stupid alternative format. Can’t even remember its name, nobody used it.

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    • NotSafeForWorld@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Fucking xps format. Like almost everything Microslop had touched, it can burn in software hell

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      • TrickDacy@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Agreed! I remember back in the day when they first created the docx format. Such bloated garbage. I think an empty file was like 100-200 KB. And PowerPoint files are unreasonably huge too

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      • Trainguyrom@reddthat.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        The best part is Word for example now by default just outputs a PDF file if you tell it to export an XPS file, which gets extra funny if you have a licensed version of Acrobat installed because Acrobat installs an extension to also export as a PDF except it works worse!

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  • sentient_loom@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    exports are subject to tariffs, only religious people can be saved. So printing is the secular, free trade choice.

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    • FudgyMcTubbs@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      I mean, it’s just common sense.

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    • someguy3@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Printing, for the rest of us!

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  • ChaoticNeutralCzech@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Similarly, Android has distinct “share” and “open with” menus but I mostly use the former as the latter.

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  • AeonFelis@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Laughing in LaTeX

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    • JustAPenguin@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Laughing harder in Typst

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      • dreadbeef@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Typst is great stuff

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      • AeonFelis@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Really want to migrate, but LyX is too good to give up…

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    • BartyDeCanter@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      I see you too are a person of culture.

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      • coherent_domain@infosec.pub ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Dude, LaTeX sucks.

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  • tomiant@piefed.social ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    I think it’s worse that it’s quicker to take a screenshot of an image online than going through the trouble of saving it.

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  • sin_free_for_00_days@sopuli.xyz ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    What a great shitpost. Fueled a strong comment section. Well done!

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  • OriginEnergySux@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Boomers made me hate PDF filea

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    • bunchberry@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      the world is run by PDF files

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      • OriginEnergySux@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        And the people who can’t open them

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      • Trainguyrom@reddthat.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Having worked at a bank, everything is PDF files. All the billions of dollars in loans, assets, and accounts etc. it’s all PDF files of agreements and terms. The entire finance industry would be heavily destabilized if the industry somehow rug pulled them on PDFs

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    • Pyr_Pressure@lemmy.ca ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Adobe made me hate pdf files.

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    • Spezi@feddit.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Most boomers I known would happily send you a docx to sign digitally. So I have to open word to save their crap to PDF to open it in Acrobat to sign it and send it back. They probably wouldnt even notice if I changed the terms in the meantime.

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    • ivanafterall@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Did you used to love pdf files?

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      • OriginEnergySux@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Back when they were cool

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      • stoly@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Is that a JE reference?

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  • portuga@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    I can think of several ways I can print a word file to pdf. In the rare occasions I might need a pdf to share. But what I mean is pdf sucks and shouldn’t be allowed on the internet

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    • unmagical@lemmy.ml ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      It’s a fine format for what it’s intended for, exact preservation of content, format, and layout. Once you start looking at a the immutable archivist/distribution format and start thinking to yourself “I’d rather like to edit that” Than you’ve messed up.

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  • sheridan@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    I discovered on Macs, you can unlock a “protected” PDF this way. Just open the PDF in Safari, File > Print > Save as PDF. It outputs a PDF that’s identical, except it’s unlocked (it doesn’t get converted to a bunch of raster images).

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    • WalrusDragonOnABike@reddthat.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Pretty sure that works on all OSes.

      Pdf24 let’s you just mass import pdfs and unlock them without destroying things like bookmarks and the text. I’m sure there’s other similar options.

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      • altkey@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        One time nothing really worked I used a pikepdf python lib. Open file -> Guess pass -> Resave. I was surprised it’s that simple.

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  • BanMe@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Who remembers printing to a Postscript file and then running that through Acrobat to get a PDF? Back in the 90s when PDFs had to be explained.

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  • Sterile_Technique@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Tech muggle here.

    Could we just get rid of PDFs and switch to word docs and spread sheets instead? I know this will likely cause a slurry of consequences, especially in professional circles, but have you considered: fuck it.?

    K thx bye.

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    • mghackerlady@leminal.space ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      No please, microsoft already has a monopoly I’d much rather the standard be open

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      • Sterile_Technique@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

        Open Office? Libre Office?

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    • AnarchistArtificer@slrpnk.net ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      That’s sort of like saying “I’m overheating because my apartment is 32ᵒC, let’s turn on the heating and see how we feel once it’s 45ᵒC”

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    • GreenDust@lemmings.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Those have different purposes. Word/Excel documents are meant to be editable so that anybody who opens the file is able to add to it, etc. A PDF is effectively the opposite. A PDF is generally meant to be an immutable document that looks the same in any program that you use to open the file.

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    • BartyDeCanter@lemmy.sdf.org ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      What if I don’t want to spend several hundred dollars per year to use a proprietary program that doesn’t run on my computer just to look at some documents?

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    • alternategait@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Excel sheets are rarely accessible to screen readers. Word documents are pretty good, but tedious if you’re just trying to like read something. PDF has the best accessibility support around (except HTML, but thats a whole other can of worms).

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    • MonkderVierte@lemmy.zip ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Can we just create a standard that is content-centric and not representation-centric? We have screenshots nowadays for that.

      Lighweight Markups are a good start. Pack it in a zip to carry media and good.

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  • AA5B@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Or alternatively, why don’t we run with that approach? So many things would benefit from “save to text”. A bit farther afield but why not save to image, save to html, etc.

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    • jollyrogue@lemmy.ml ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      We should. It’s a good abstractions for document conversion.

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  • marcos@lemmy.world ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Writing that PDF into an USB device or into a new file are basically the same thing…

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  • Diddlydee@feddit.uk ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    What? I just click export.

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    • WalrusDragonOnABike@reddthat.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

      Sometimes people have things saved to Google drive with the setting to save disabled but allow printing. Which means you can just print to pdf. Only case where I can think of where printing to PDF is the easiest option.

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  • AethiopeRoot@lemmy.zip ⁨1⁩ ⁨month⁩ ago

    Lol …accurate

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