Adobe Acrobat PDFMaker Removal

[Prince Namor]

Any one know how to remove the add-in Adobe Acrobat PDFMaker from MS
Word! It is sooooo slow (both loading and in printing a PDF file)!!

 

[Eric Olson [MSFT]]

Check the following location:

Microsoft Office X: Office: Startup: Word

Look for PDF Maker.dot and remove it.


Eric Olson [MSFT]

This posting is provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confers no rights.

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur [MVP]]

Check the following location:

Microsoft Office X: Office: Startup: Word

Look for PDF Maker.dot and remove it.

Also make sure you disable the reinstallation of the plug-in the next
time you launch Acrobat. THe applciation has a nasty tendency to
reinstall it every time...


Corentin

 

[Diane Dennis]

Hi All!

I'm on OS 10.1.5 using Word 10.1.5 and Acrobat 5.0.5. I have followed
every bit of instruction I can find here to try to make my Word X open
quicker, to no avail.

I've removed the pdfmaker.dot (as well as the ppa and xcl) from the
Office X folder and I've even removed the pdfmaker.dot from the
Acrobat 5.0 folder.

I started thinking that maybe it's just the way Word opens but on my
laptop, which has OS 10.2, Word X opens lightning quick. That leads
me to believe that it is a conflict with another application (of which
I'm assuming to be Acrobat 5.0.5).

Does anybody have any other suggestions as to what I can try?

Thank you so much and have an outstanding day!!
Diane Dennis

 

[John McGhie [MVP - Word]]

Hi Diane:

I am pretty sure it's PDF Maker that's doing it.

Have a quick look: Acrobat has a very disgusting habit of putting PDF Maker
BACK every time it runs. There's an option there somewhere in Acrobat that
says "Do not install PDF Maker. Do not ever install PDF Maker. I do not
WANT PDF Maker. Do not EVER try to put it back. Make it GONE!!"

Or words to that effect.

Unless you really insist, you will get a fresh brand new copy of PDF Maker
in all the usual places every time you run Acrobat.

The other thing that can be doing it is your Fonts. If you have a very
large number of fonts and one or more is damaged, that can cause the
problem. So can an unavailable Printer, Template, or File Server.

First look to ensure PDF Maker has not come back. If it hasn't, post back
and we will step you through the rather lengthy diagnostic procedures for
the other possibilities.

Cheers


This responds to article <[email protected]>,

Hi All!

I'm on OS 10.1.5 using Word 10.1.5 and Acrobat 5.0.5. I have followed
every bit of instruction I can find here to try to make my Word X open
quicker, to no avail.

I've removed the pdfmaker.dot (as well as the ppa and xcl) from the
Office X folder and I've even removed the pdfmaker.dot from the
Acrobat 5.0 folder.

I started thinking that maybe it's just the way Word opens but on my
laptop, which has OS 10.2, Word X opens lightning quick. That leads
me to believe that it is a conflict with another application (of which
I'm assuming to be Acrobat 5.0.5).

Does anybody have any other suggestions as to what I can try?

Thank you so much and have an outstanding day!!
Diane Dennis

--

Please respond only to the newsgroup to preserve the thread.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. GMT + 10 Hrs
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[Diane Dennis]

Hi John!

Thank you for your response! I checked and PDFMaker hasn't been
reinstalled. I decided to go to the Adobe Support Knowledgebase and
think I might have found out something...

------
At this webpage: http://www.adobe.com/support/techdocs/2cc1a.htm

PDFMaker is unavailable in Office applications in Mac OS X
Adobe Acrobat PDFMaker (also called Convert to Adobe PDF) isn't
available in Microsoft Office applications in Mac OS X. You can,
however, use PDFMaker with Office applications in Classic mode.

Note: PDFMaker doesn't work with Office v. X applications in Native
mode or Classic mode.
------

Wondering if this means I should start-up Classic and look for
PDFMaker there? Or maybe I should be looking in the Distiller
application (which also requires a Classic startup) for the "Do Not
Install PDFMaker" option?

I say "start-up Classic" because normally I don't run Classic because
my printer won't work in Classic. To add insult to injury, I can't
just shut down Classic when I want to use my printer, I have to
completely restart my computer...

Anyhow, I'm going to start Classic and look for the PDFMaker and I
thank you for the help you are giving me.

Have a terrific day!!
Diane

 

[John McGhie [MVP - Word]]

Hi Diane:

If PDF Maker is not in the usual places, then whatever the problem is, it is
NOT PDF Maker.

Nothing in Classic can affect OS X while Classic is not running. So it's
not that either.

The next place I would look is the Font Cache: find the Microsoft Office
Font Cache and delete it. All Microsoft applications must be quit when you
do this. Then reboot your system to force it to rebuild the OS X Font
Cache, from which the MS Office applications will then rebuild theirs.

The other thing I would be suspicious about are other add-ins. EndNote's
Cite While You Write feature is a particular suspect.

Hope this helps


This responds to article <[email protected]>,

Hi John!

Thank you for your response! I checked and PDFMaker hasn't been
reinstalled. I decided to go to the Adobe Support Knowledgebase and
think I might have found out something...

------
At this webpage: http://www.adobe.com/support/techdocs/2cc1a.htm

PDFMaker is unavailable in Office applications in Mac OS X
Adobe Acrobat PDFMaker (also called Convert to Adobe PDF) isn't
available in Microsoft Office applications in Mac OS X. You can,
however, use PDFMaker with Office applications in Classic mode.

Note: PDFMaker doesn't work with Office v. X applications in Native
mode or Classic mode.
------

Wondering if this means I should start-up Classic and look for
PDFMaker there? Or maybe I should be looking in the Distiller
application (which also requires a Classic startup) for the "Do Not
Install PDFMaker" option?

I say "start-up Classic" because normally I don't run Classic because
my printer won't work in Classic. To add insult to injury, I can't
just shut down Classic when I want to use my printer, I have to
completely restart my computer...

Anyhow, I'm going to start Classic and look for the PDFMaker and I
thank you for the help you are giving me.

Have a terrific day!!
Diane

--

Please respond only to the newsgroup to preserve the thread.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. GMT + 10 Hrs
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[Diane Dennis]

Hi John!

Well, unfortunately deleting the Office Font Cache didn't do it
either...

About add-ins... I looked in the Microsoft Office X > Office >
Add-Ins and I found the following files:

Camera & Scanner Plug-in
Conditional Sum Wizard
EuroConvert Library
Eurotool.xla
SaveAsMovie Wizard

Do I need the above "add-ins" and can any of the above "add-ins" be
the culprit?

I searched using Sherlock but couldn't find the EndNote's Cite While
You Write that you mentioned.

I guess I should let you know in case it makes a difference, I haven't
deleted the pdfmaker.dot pdfmaker.ppa pdfmaker.xla files from my
system but rather they're in a folder sitting on my desktop. Could
that be causing a problem?

Thank you again for your help John!
Diane

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur [MVP]]

I searched using Sherlock but couldn't find the EndNote's Cite While
You Write that you mentioned.

The Adober PDF plug-in as well as the EndNote plug-in live in
/Application/Microsoft Office X/Office/Startup/Word
when they are active.
Move them out of this folder to deactivate them.

both are known trouble makers...

I'd also suggest deleting the Carbon Registration Database in your
preferences folder (in the Microsoft folder there). It will be
re-created fresh the first time tyou launch Office.



Corentin

 

[Diane Dennis]

Hi John!

Thank you for the info.

I got through #2 and stalled at #3. When I open Disk Utility to
Repair Permissions, there isn't an option that I can locate that
allows me to Repair Permissions.

I'm wondering if you meant Repair Privileges however Disk Utility
doesn't have that option either.

So, because I happen to have the application Repair Privileges and
hoping that you did mean Repair Privileges I'm going to do that in
place of #3 and then continue on to #4.... I'll keep you posted...

Thank you again!
Diane

 

[Diane Dennis]

Hi John!

Well.... I guess it's time to get desperate...

I had the cable unplugged and everything but it still had the problem.

Desperation calls for..... !!! .H.E.L.P. !!!

Thank you very much for sticking with me on this John!

Have a great night!
Diane

 

[John McGhie [MVP - Word]]

Hi Diane:

I am not sure that you followed the instructions exactly.

You needed to:

1) Remove Office using the Remove Office application

2) Re-install Office, using the Installer

3) Repair Permissions, using Disk Utility

4) Re-apply the service packs

If you didn't do that, the service packs won't install properly and nothing
works.

Can you just confirm that that's what you have done. Repairing permissions
using anything but Disk Utility means we now cannot be sure what state your
system is in.

If that's what you have done, then I am going to ask Corentin to come back
here. Corentin is one of our most expert Macintosh OS X persons, he has
much more extensive knowledge of the low-level system operation than I have.

Cheers

This responds to article <[email protected]>,

Hi John!

Well.... I guess it's time to get desperate...

I had the cable unplugged and everything but it still had the problem.

Desperation calls for..... !!! .H.E.L.P. !!!

Thank you very much for sticking with me on this John!

Have a great night!
Diane

--

Please respond only to the newsgroup to preserve the thread.

John McGhie, Consultant Technical Writer,
McGhie Information Engineering Pty Ltd
Sydney, Australia. GMT + 10 Hrs
+61 4 1209 1410, mailto:[email protected]

 

[Corentin Cras-Méneur [MVP]]

Hi Diane:

I am not sure that you followed the instructions exactly.

You needed to:

1) Remove Office using the Remove Office application

I would then check the hard drive for problems. DIskUtility is a good
start but if you have a better app like Norton
Utility/DiskWarrior/TechTool pro, now would be a good time to use
them...

2) Re-install Office, using the Installer

3) Repair Permissions, using Disk Utility

I'm not sure DiskUtility offers that in 10.1.5. I think it came with
10.2. You can use the application Apple provided for that though:

Repair Privileges Utility 1.1 for MacOS 10.1.5:
http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=106900

4) Re-apply the service packs

If you didn't do that, the service packs won't install properly and nothing
works.

I would even repair permissions after updating the whole thing.
Sometimes in the updating process, permissions get completely hosed :-\

Can you just confirm that that's what you have done. Repairing permissions
using anything but Disk Utility means we now cannot be sure what state your
system is in.

Well you can use the Terminal safely for that:
sudo diskutil repairPermissions /

There are several apps out there that actually use this command to do
the same thing (eg Cocktail and TinkerTool System). This would be
equallly safe since all these apps are just front-end for the Terminal
command. You should remember to only repair permissions on the boot
volume though. I've seen many problems from people repairing permissions
botting on one volume and repairing on the other.

If that's what you have done, then I am going to ask Corentin to come back
here. Corentin is one of our most expert Macintosh OS X persons, he has
much more extensive knowledge of the low-level system operation than I have.

Wooops, that's a vast overstatement John... But I'll be happy to try and
help.

I'd like to get back to two points though:
- Make sure that in the uninstall process, the Carbon Registration
Database has been deleted. This pref file is often the source of many
many problems.
- The EndNote plug-in resides in /Application/Microsoft Office
X/Office/Startup/Word
Make sure to move it out of this folder to test whether it is involved
in the problem you're having.


Let me know if you are still having problems.


Corentin