Convert pdf > doc

August 14, 2005 5:39 PM

I need a way to convert a pdf file to a Microsoft Word (.doc) file. It has to be free, preferably online if possible, and if there is no suitable online version it should be compatible with OS X. Any suggestions?
posted by teem to computers & internet (13 comments total)

You might try PDFonline to get from .pdf to .doc by way of html. At any rate, it's not a bad site to have bookmarked.
posted by klarck at 6:25 PM on August 14, 2005

Are you on OS X? If so you can just do it via the print window.
posted by nathan_teske at 6:28 PM on August 14, 2005

Or email the pdf to [e-mail] and receive a text version of the document back within minutes.
posted by blag at 6:29 PM on August 14, 2005 [1 favorite]

I think you've got that backwards, nathan_teske, the standard print dialog box includes a "Save as PDF" button.
posted by themadjuggler at 6:30 PM on August 14, 2005

Doh never mind, I misread.
posted by nathan_teske at 6:31 PM on August 14, 2005

Since Acrobat 5, you can save PDF files as RTF (rich text format) documents, which can be opened with Microsoft Word.

Alternatively, you can use an application like OmniPage Pro to directly convert PDF to Word .doc via its OCR functionality.
posted by Rothko at 7:58 PM on August 14, 2005

Open Office does all sorts of conversions, and is free.
posted by The Jesse Helms at 8:33 PM on August 14, 2005

That's a nice resource, thanks blag!
posted by odinsdream at 9:01 PM on August 14, 2005

Can the creator of a PDF file prevent this conversion?
posted by stevil at 9:11 AM on August 15, 2005

Sure, just make the PDF from noisy image files.
posted by Rothko at 1:46 PM on August 15, 2005

stevil: "Can the creator of a PDF file prevent this conversion?"

Yes, but only through Adobe's built-in protection. There are various tools out there that will strip all Adobe DRM from PDFs so you're back to square one. It should provide protection against the less tech-savvy users, though.
posted by blag at 5:44 PM on August 15, 2005

stevil, why would you want to do such a thing, that's horribly unfriendly...
posted by odinsdream at 7:21 AM on August 16, 2005

Well the PDF could be a govermental form they do not want edited for one.
posted by parallax7d at 9:27 AM on August 16, 2005