On 5/26/15 11:17 AM, Neil Gould wrote:
Ken Springer wrote:
On 5/26/15 5:31 AM, Neil Gould wrote:
Ken Springer wrote:

With my way, users can
select whatever software they wish, and only have to be able to
create a basic PDF file, which can be done with a free printer
driver in Windows, or natively in OS X.

One hasn't had to have a printer driver for PDFs since DOS days, and
then it had to be a PostScript printer. There are many PDF writing
apps available that don't depend on an installed printer at all.
Several of them are free.

By PDF writing apps, I assume you mean Adobe Acrobat type software,
albeit free? I've never looked for any of those, the PDF creation
items I've needed personally just don't justify the time and effort,
especially when an alternative PDF reader often installs a PDF printer
driver.

For me and my needs, the shortest path to a PDF file is a printer
driver. G

We may be talking about the same thing. There are apps that can create PDFs
from most apps and install the option to select them as a "printer driver",
but there is usually not an associated printer that could be driven by its
output, ergo, it's not really a printer driver.

We may be. In my case, when I open the Print dialogue, in addition to
the various printers that may be there, there is a PDF printer listed.
Select that, and a PDF file is written to the hard drive. As usual,
different drivers here have different PDF creation settings.

Unlike my understanding of "apps that can create PDFs from most apps",
this way I can create a PDF from any app. OS X, at least starting with
10.5 Leopard, offers this natively in it's Print dialogue.

--
Ken
Mac OS X 10.8.5
Firefox 36.0.4
Thunderbird 31.5
"My brain is like lightning, a quick flash
and it's gone!"