Why doesn't Word for Mac make a PDF with outside page numbers?

April 12, 2006 2:21 PM

Why does Word 2004 (OS X 10.4.3) freak out when printing a PDF of a document with the "different odd and even pages" pagination setting? How can I convince it that everything is OK?

Every time I try to print out my thesis, Word freezes (complete with spinning ball of doom) while processing page three, the first page with an even number at the top. Any other type of pagination setting lets me create a PDF, but I prefer the "outside" setting for the final printed copy.What I've tried:

• Converting the .doc file to .rtf and making that a PDF. Doing this works except that it throws off a lot of formatting (important here because of precise hyphenation)
• PDFOnline.com. While useful, this conversion lost all sorts of formatting, notably the main font, Hoefler Text.
• Using Acrobat itself. I'm not too familiar with the program (it's on the college computers, not mine), it seems to suggest using its built-in functionality in Word.

How can I retain all this picky formatting and convert this thing to a PDF? Thanks, as always, for your help!

posted by themadjuggler to computers & internet (3 comments total)

Have you tried "print as image" in your printer settings? That cleared up a lot of odd PDF printing issues (though I never had this particular one) for me, in both XP and OSX10.4.
posted by Rumple at 2:28 PM on April 12, 2006

What I would say if you were my student:

(1) Check to make sure that your pagination is allowed by the thesis standards. If you were my student, I would probably know this.

(2) Nobody but you cares in the slightest how it is paginated, so long as it obeys any rules that are set out for theses. Which means that this: Any other type of pagination setting lets me create a PDF is your answer -- print the damn thing with different pagination and be done with it.

(3) If you really insist on it, try printing to postscript (select a laserwriter and print to file, saving as .ps) and use ghostview/ghostscript or Mac equivalent to convert to PDF.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 3:22 PM on April 12, 2006

All great advice-- there are basically no thesis standards (small, laid back English department), so this is all typesetting nit-picking. I'll let you know if it works!
posted by themadjuggler at 5:14 PM on April 12, 2006