PDFs and bookmarking.

[Zenodotus of Ephesus]

Case in point on bookmarking in this new review here.

 

[pogre]

OK - I guess I read this poll as asking if I would be willing to pay more for bookmarks. I print PDFs and read them, so the answermfor me is no. After reading the responses on this thread I fully anticipate being hunted down and killed. Thanks for making it an open poll Joe B.!

 

[jgbrowning]

The poll is:

If you have two versions of a PDF, one with bookmarks and one without bookmarks, and they're the same price which one would you prefer.

Someone else brought up the "would you pay more" bit, but that's not what this poll is about.

joe b.

 

[D_Sinclair]

One company I asked said that it was a compatibility issue with older computers and versions of Acrobat.

Hence my wondering of what part of the market can't use those features. I know some computers can't be upgraded due to financial costs, I havent' upgraded mine in like four years, but at the same time, what part of the market are those people and do you want to work actively to keep them by messing with a feature that the majoirty of it wants?

That's just BS. Alternate Realities Publications puts bookmarks in PDFs that are compliant for use in Acrobat for DOS 2.0. And yes, we do have a copy of Acrobat Reader for DOS 2.0 kicking around. Came on an Ultima VI CD-ROM.

 

[Sigurd]

I think if you care about the use and enjoyment of your product you bookmark. If you don't you send a very bad message to your reader. At any size, bookmarking for a pdf is like page justification and punctuation -- ignore it at your peril. A PDF I refer to in the middle of the game that doesn't have a good index and bookmarks will slow me down while I'm trying to be considerate of my players or DM. I don't appreciate having to fumble around.

Good product organization is at least as important as any other element of publishing. There is no acceptable reason in my mind for not including bookmarks on any publication bigger than a single page.

 

[pogre]

The poll is:

If you have two versions of a PDF, one with bookmarks and one without bookmarks, and they're the same price which one would you prefer.

Someone else brought up the "would you pay more" bit, but that's not what this poll is about.

joe b.

Yeah, I figured it out after reading through the thread and after voting. I know, I know - learn to read pogre!

In other words for the same price do I want a feature added or not? What kind of poll is this? It feels like a Cuban national election

 

[johnsemlak]

Another note that relates is security setting on PDFs. I have a number of them that are set so as to not allow the creation of bookmarks by the user (most Malhavoc PDFs are this way.) That irritates me, because - well, like I would with a normal book - I'd often like to mark a place I found particularly important. Granted, the Malhavoc PDFs are always well-bookmarked to begin with, but there have still been times when I wanted to bookmark something specific in there, and "gee, too bad." This isn't a dealbreaker for me - heck, even a complete lack of bookmarks isn't, though I much prefer them and am less likely to purchase more from the publisher if they're not included - but it's certainly an irritation.

I completely agree with this comment. I find PDFs I can't add bookmarks to irritating, especially if it didn't have bookmarks to begin with. Many of the watermarked PDFs based on print RPG materials sold at DTRPG are this way.