Flash Combines With PDF In Acrobat 9 (Page 3)

Rich media

There’s also a new “Multimedia” button that will allow you to add multimedia to PDF files. Having such media as video and audio is nothing new to PDF, but now that Acrobat 9 Pro has built-in Flash support it can play such media on its own—no need for plug-ins or supporting applications like QuickTime Player. Consider what you can play in Adobe Flash Player: video, audio, animations, 3D graphics, and Flash and Flex applications. All these are now fair game within the PDF format. This Flash-friendly format will work with Adobe Reader 9 so you won’t need Acrobat 9 to view the Flash material (you will need to upgrade from versions 8 or older, of course).

Why Flash?

During the product demo and briefing, I asked what Acrobat 9 Pro’s target market was and the answer was not much different from the Acrobat 8 launch: Acrobat is designed for designers, print professionals and education customers. However, there is a significant difference now: Acrobat 9 Pro is also designed with web professionals in mind. With Acrobat 9, PDF is no longer just a format for posting documents online—now it’s a new platform for Flash applications and content. That is definitely in the realm of the web designer and developer. I’m still not sure how PDF distribution will trump online distribution, but maybe it’s not supposed to—maybe it’s supposed to complement it and allow content back onto the desktop via e-mail and other methods of distribution. Adobe AIR is another recent move toward the desktop.

Whatever the case, the marriage of PDF and Flash means that the convergence of Adobe technologies and content across the creative professional landscape is moving forward.