CIB PDF Plug-In for Microsoft Word
Book Review

By Dale Farris, Secretary Golden Triangle PC Club June 2005 General Overview With this neat Word plug-in, you can create professional PDF documents directly from within Microsoft Word, including character-font embedding, document protection, and picture compression. The CIB office modules currently support all versions of Microsoft Word up to Word 2003. Make sure that you have installed the latest service pack for your version of Word. The latest versions are: Word 97 service pack 2, Word 2000 service pack 3, and Word XP service pack 2. New Release The new release fulfills a large number of extension wishes that were communicated to the company by their customers. Additional functions of the Licensed Version Send Documents - The converted document can be sent directly by e-mail. Encrypt Document - Using encryption, you can control what possibilities the reader has when using your document. When converting, you can choose whether the reader can print the document or not, can change the document or not, can add notes to the document or not, can make form entries or not, can copy parts of the document into the clipboard or not, can make modifications to pages, can open the document with or without a password, and whether contents can be read using a screen reader. At the same time, the password assigned for the security options always ensures full access to your document. Embed Character Fonts - By embedding character fonts, you can reliably ensure that your document is displayed with the character fonts chosen by you, even if they are not installed on the reader's system. In this way, your corporate identity retains the same look and feel across all platforms. Character Font Options - Here, you can check what character fonts the current document contains and select which of them are to be embedded. Basic Rules for Character Font Options - Here, you define the basic specifications for character-font embedding. You choose what character fonts are always embedded and what ones are never embedded. Optimizing the Storage Space Requirement for Pictures - Using this, you can considerably reduce the file size of documents containing pictures. Various resolutions and a continuously adjustable compression rate are available. Define the Appearance When the PDF File is Opened - Here, you pre-specify the view in which the PDF document is opened by the user, for instance with continuous double pages. You can also select a starting page on which the document will then always be opened. Functions in Freeware-Version Create PDF Simply and Straightforwardly From Within Word - The conversion technology used generates PDF documents quickly and directly from within Microsoft Word. In the process, the document properties and links are also incorporated into the PDF document. Customize the Word Field FILENAME - Here, you can simply choose whether the field function FILENAME is to be assigned the name of the Word document or that of the PDF document. Use Watermark - You can assign watermarks to your documents which will appear as the background of all pages. Options for Program Execution - Customize the plug-in in accordance with your preferences using the following options: Operations after PDF Conversion For example, you can have the PDF file displayed automatically for checking purposes or else call a third-party program. Specifications for the destination filename A default setting can be specified automatically for the name and/or for the directory of the generated PDF file. What happens when overwriting existing PDF files The plug-in normally prompts the user that the file already exists. However, depending on the setting, the file can also be overwritten automatically without prompting or else numbered consecutively. Saving the Word document automatically The plug-in only converts saved documents. Using this setting, the document is saved automatically when you start the plug-in. Target Customers This program offers super PDF file creation functionality at a far more realistic, and reasonable price than found in Adobe's Acrobat PDF creator program. Adobe's Acrobat Standard sells for $299, and Acrobat Professional sells for $449. While CIB's program is certainly no Acrobat, it does provide many fundamental PDF creation features that will likely suit most all customers, especially those not interested in paying hundreds and hundreds of dollars for Adobe's more complex program. System Requirements Microsoft Word 97, 2000, XP, 2003 Windows 95, 98, ME, NT4, 2000, Server 2003, XP File size: 4 MB (download) List Price $19.00 EURO Download CIB pdf products free of charge from the company's web site, and proceed to download. Following installation, you may use the products free of charge without a license, provided you do so for your own private or personal use, or for testing purposes. A no-charge demonstration version containing the full functional scope of CIB pdf formfields is also available for evaluation. Licensing: After installation, the products can be activated at any time by entering a license key. You can easily purchase the required license data online on our order pages. Other Products From CIB Software BmbH CIB pdf brewer For getting pdf-documents from within other applications (i.e. browser, ...) the company offers CIB pdf brewer. CIB pdf brewer installs itself as a printer driver on your system. The printer driver technology doesn't allow active elements in PDFs like hyperlinks, but it is very useful with complex formatted documents as they are converted identically. The professional version also offers features like graphic compression, document protection, font embedding, etc. CIB pdf brewer is available for Windows NT4, 2000 and XP. For further deails please have a look at: www.cib.de/english/products/pdf/professional.htm www.cib.de/english/products/pdf/professional.htm CIB pdf formfields The fastest way to professional PDF forms directly from within Microsoft Word. You get all the features of the professional version and can also convert all the Word form options directly to the corresponding PDF form options with no need for any post-editing work. Please consider the fact that CIB PDF Formfields already contains CIB PDF Plug-in. So licensing of CIB PDF Formfields is at the same moment licensing of CIB pdf Plug-in. The following products will be published soon: - CIB e.pdf Re-edit your created pdf document without any loss. Just work with only one document and get rid of bothering search after the genuine document. You decide whether the recipient shall be able to edit the document or not. - CIB pdf view The slim alternative to Adobe Reader. Background-printing is possible. All in all: With these solutions you will able to create pdf-documents from within all Windows-applications. CoMod (CIB office Modules) Apart from that, CIB software offers its customers professional software for uniform output and document management. CoMod provides you with innovative and high-performance standard modules. The combination of these modules delivers the optimum solution which is also adapted to your case-specific requirements. Just a short outline of CoMod properties: XML support Java integration Optimized multithreading New and improved output formats Cross-operating-system use Optimization of document workflow Performance optimizations XML Support CIB merge provides access to XML utility data by means of XPath and, in the process, also supports the validation of DTDs. In this way, data pools can be processed sequentially or else individual pieces of information can also be picked out randomly. Simultaneous access operations to utility data contained in multiple sources are also possible in the accustomed way. The migration of existing solutions e.g. from CSV to XML, is very simple and is generally even possible without structural changes being made to the raw texts. Java Integration All CIB office modules can be called freely from Java applications via the Java wrappers and their complete functional scope can be used. Thus, all possible server and application-server scenarios in Java or J2EE environments are covered. You create your document modules in the familiar manner using your standard word processor and can thus generate your documents on all of your platforms and from within any number of applications and even process the documents further across several platforms. Optimized Multithreading The CIB modules support multithreading in all available operating system platforms and on the common application servers (e.g. Tomcat, Bea Weblogic, IBM Websphere) or the Microsoft Transaction Server. New Output Formats CIB tiff creates a TIFF graphic from the resulting document. During creation, the depth of color, the resolution and the compression can be chosen individually. CIB pcl creates a PCL output from the resulting document. This PCL output can be saved as a file or else passed on directly to an appropriate printer. When creating the PCL output, the typical print-environment settings can be chosen e.g. resolution, simplex / duplex printing, paper tray selection, number of copies, handling of the character font types etc. CIB postscript creates a PostScript output from the resulting document. This PostScript output can be saved as a file or else passed on directly to an appropriate printer. When creating the PostScript output, the typical print-environment settings can be chosen e.g. resolution, simplex / duplex printing, paper tray selection, number of copies, handling of the character font types etc. CIB mapi automated sending of e-mails in Windows (support for MAPI) Enhanced Output Formats Alignment of the line and page break to MS-Word Optional line print (suppression of form feeds) Printer and driver independence when calculating the line and page breaks CIB html Optimization of the file sizes CIB ascii Optional tables and text output with layout (e.g. in order to display the document on 3270-terminals as identically as possible with the original layout) Cross-Operating System Use Operating-system-independent use by virtue of direct support of font formats (Type1, TTF), print control (basis: PPD files) and printer and driver independence in the calculation of the line and page breaks Further use and processing of the created documents independently of the operating system on which they were created Extension of the RTF data format (Word 2000, compatibility with Office XP) The CIB components were also released for further operating system platforms. A document can be filled with data in several steps (e.g. first data from a database and then interactively by the user). It is possible to configure and control what data are merged at what time and whether these data can be overwritten. Even after the document generation is completed, it is possible to distinguish between the predefined static text and the merged variable data. The predefined field function and the merged value are both present (keyword: keep switch) Support of MultiRTF documents in outputting to other formats (PDF, ASCII, tiff, html, pcl, ps). Here, it is possible to choose whether the file is to be output to one or more output files. Connection of customized routines / programs to individual entry fields (callback interfaces for entry fields can be used via the API) Performance optimizations Performance Optimization of CIB Merge Optimization of the RTF data structure and the RTF file size List-table and font-table optimization (e.g. removal of superfluous entries) Removal of redundant RTF information Incorporation of list formatting from included documents About CIB Software GmbH In 1989, Graduate Engineer (Diplom-Ingenieur) Ulrich Brandner, who had succeeded in convincing the then board of directors of Nixdorf AG of his visions, founded CIB software GmbH with a staff of 6 employees in the scope of a spin-off. At the time of formation, which took place with the minority equitable interest of NCAG, the fledgling CIB software GmbH was able to build upon several years of experience in the area of financial institutions. On account of the rapid growth, the company moved within Munich from Ungerer Strasse to larger business offices in Riesstrasse. With the purchase of the shares from Siemens Nixdorf (SNI), founded in 1990, now only shareholders working within CIB remained. In order to enlarge the existing offering of products and to acquire the necessary insurance know-how, the management purchased the company FGP, founded in 1987. With AKDB and the Austrian Federal Army, CIB was able to gain two major customers and thus also increasingly establish itself in the area of public administration. For marketing reasons, CIB software - which represents the service side of things - was given the name CIB consulting. FGP on the other hand, which was handling product development, changed its name to CIB software. The significantly expanded product range necessitated a split-up. The company AVP, which had since been founded, was given the well-proven name CIB software. FAIR4U, a company that returned to the insurance-software origins rooted in FGP, emerged from the former CIB software. This growth gave rise to another relocation move by the company to the present headquarters of all companies - Stuntzstrasse 16, in Munich's district of Bogenhausen. In order to round off the existing offering in a service-oriented manner, CIB services emerged as a service provider for texts, organization and creation. Thus, the CIB Group currently consists of the 4 companies: CIB consulting CIB software CIB services Fair4U CIB consulting GmbH is the innovative consultancy and software house for individually supporting your projects from the planning phase, through to the realization and all the way to maintenance. CIB software GmbH is a manufacturer of high-performance standard applications in the whole area of output and document management. Approximately 400,000 licenses are currently in productive use. Contact CIB Software Main Headquarters Munich Stuntzstraße 16 D-81677 Munich Germany +49 89 143 60-0 FAX +49 89 143 60-100 info@cib.de www.cib.de/english