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Thank you all for commiserating and/or suggesting a way to crack that darn
PDF file. Incidentally, I do have a full version of Adobe Acrobat, but I do
not have access to the source file or author.
Several of you suggested using the Save As command and saving without
security. This file is password protected (and I don't have the password),
so Save As does not work in this manner. I can only save it as another file
with the same level of security.
Others of you suggested printing to a postscript file and distilling back
into Acrobat without security. This crazy file only lets you print to an
actual printer! It will not allow you to print to another PDF or print
file! It also errors out if you try to print a page range instead of the
entire document. It's really unbelievable.
And more than one among you suggested printing a hard copy, using high
quality OCR software and scanning it in. Good suggestion and one that will
undoubtedly work (we even have this software already), but I was hoping to
avoid this drastic of a measure because it will require much rework.
Still others suggested using password cracking/unencryption software, which
I'd never heard of but which is now among my new favorite things ever
invented. I feel like a hacker! I downloaded a sample software package & it
unencrypted the file. It worked beautifully. As far as I can tell, there's
nothing illegal about this & due to the nature of the document, I am not
violating any service agreements or copyrights.
Thanks again for your willingness to help. I hope this summary may in turn
help you should you ever face the same problem.
Ruth
PS
If you, as a writer in control of document security, ever get the urge to
password protect/encrypt a file, please make sure that it is absolutely
necessary. If you do protect a file, make sure you keep a list of passwords
somewhere & pass it on to those after you who may be responsible for
maintaining the document!
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