Adobe Acrobat and Electronic Reserves

You may have noticed that a number of files on electronic reserves are in a format created through Adobe Acrobat called PDF, or Portable Document Format. PDF documents offer a number of advantages to users of electronic reserves, including:

Reduced file size
Ability to work across all platforms, including Macs and PCs
Increased flexibility within documents to move among pages, enlarge particular sections of a document, search for words or phrases, etc.
Retention of all formatting, charts, fonts, graphics, images, tables, columns, etc.

In order to read files in this format, the Acrobat Reader must be installed on your machine. Adobe Acrobat will work seamlessly on most internet browsers on campus because ISR has installed the reader on all of the machines in the academic labs. In addition, ISR has added the reader to the set of programs that are included for students who have connected to the campus through Res Net. For individual machines, students and faculty can also use versions of the Acrobat Reader that are found on the campus servers - a quick call to the ISR tech desk at 7-7777 should help with your particular situation. Finally, you can download the newest version of the Reader for free over the internet directly from the Adobe site.

How does it work?

We scan documents here in the library, then convert them to the Acrobat format, then upload them to the ERes server. Our electronic reserve software allows us to add the document to ERes, where they can be viewed or accessed from internet browsers across campus.

If you have any questions about the use of Adobe Acrobat for Bucknell's electronic reserves, please call Deb Balducci at 577-3709 or Mary Beth James at 577-1038.