Annotating in Kofax Power PDF
Note-taking and annotations, in general, are a cornerstone of many collaborative processes. Consider an important document such as a quarterly progress report on an internal project or a proposal for a future investment a company should make. Getting the language right and presenting the correct data concisely and understandably is essential — and that isn’t a one-person job. Sharing notes between a writer and an editor or other team members can pave the way to better results.
Passing marked-up hard copies back and forth is a recipe for confusion and slow results. Papers might get lost or a key contributor might be out of the office. Working entirely in a digital format such as PDF offers a valuable advantage: digital annotations. When you edit a PDF this way, it’s similar to but more effective than working in hard copy.
With Kofax Power PDF, you can easily add many kinds of annotations to documents to support your research or collaborative writing. Here’s what you should know.
What Are PDF Annotations and What Kinds Are There?
PDF annotations are a class of different types of markup and note-taking tools. However, unlike marking up a real hard copy, the document stores these annotations on a separate “layer.” That means the original document remains unaltered, so you always have a “clean” version of the document ready to share or modify as necessary.
There are several types of digital annotations you can make with Power PDF.
- Attachments. Add actual digital attachments, such as a brief and relevant video clip from a meeting about a section of content.
- Text boxes and callouts. Draw a box directly on the document and add your notes on the page itself. Callouts are text boxes with arrows pointing to specific content.
- Notes. A basic type of annotation, the sticky note tool works identical to its real-world counterparts — they sit “on top” of the content.
- Markup. A set of editing tools, such as strikeouts, underlines, highlighters, and more.
- Drawings. Make a drawing, add a graphic object directly on the page, or use symbols to indicate editing changes.
Annotating Made Easy: A Quick How-To Guide
Accessing these tools is very easy with a fully-featured tool such as Power PDF. Accessing the tools to comment in PDF and starting to make annotations takes only four steps:
- Open the PDF you want to annotate.
- Select the “Comment” tab from the main ribbon navigation bar.
- Select the tools you wish to use. For example, sticky notes are the first option in the “Annotate” section of the comment bar.
- Make your notes and save a copy of the document.
Video: How to Add Comments to a PDF Document in Kofax Power PDF
Including Your Annotations in Hard Copy
"Export" is not usually a term that you’ll encounter within PDF editing software or a method that you’ll use to save files in such programs. Instead, you will typically see this option in other programs that can create PDFs out of their files, such as image editing software. In these cases, the program "exports" the file into a PDF version, which you can then continue to work on elsewhere.
Because annotations exist in their own layer, you won’t usually see them if you print the marked-up document to hard copy. Power PDF also makes it easy to print with comments included - here’s how:
- With the PDF file open, select File, then Print, and tick the box for “Print with Comments.”
- Select the type of comment display you want to print. You can print comments only, a list of numbered comments, or single and multi-page displays with lines linking comments to their location.
- Set other options such as page and font size to suit your specific needs.
- Click OK, then click Print.
Find an Easier Way to Annotate a PDF Today
Annotations add flexibility and usefulness to PDFs, giving you an easy way to take private notes on a document for your future reference or as a tool for collaboration and editing. With the right software to unlock that functionality and a full suite of editing tools, such as Power PDF, you can make the time you spend working with PDFs more productive. Download and install your free 15-day trial version today to see how undemanding it can be to take extensive notes on PDFs whenever necessary.
