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Sending Trees by E-mail
The best way to send PediTree output in electronic form whilst preserving the layout is to make a Portable Document Format (PDF) file from it and send that.
A PDF file can be displayed by using a suitable program, often pre-installed on a new computer. The standard program for this is Adobe Acrobat Reader, which is readily available at no cost on many magazine-cover CD-ROMs, with some purchased applications, or by download from http://www.adobe.com/. A faster and smaller alternative is Foxit Reader, which can be downloaded from http://www.foxitsoftware.com/. Both are free of charge.
There are several different ways to produce a PDF file from PediTree output without spending much money. They all involve installing a Windows Printer-driver that either produces a PDF file as output or an intermediate file that can be converted to the PDF form.
The writer uses PDF Creator, available from http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator/. Once downloaded and installed, this appears as a Windows printer called PDF Creator. If you select this printer to 'print' a Tree or other chart in the usual way, then you are prompted for a filename for the PDF output. Here is a small two-page example.
Other software suggested by contributors to the PUG-L mailing-list is:
- Use a Windows printer-driver to produce a PostScript output file, such as the HP1200PS driver supplied with most versions of Windows. Then use Acrobat Distiller (expensive) or Ghostscript (free from http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ghost) to convert the PostScript file to PDF. (This is effectively what PDF Creator does in one step, but is more complicated to use.)
- PDF995 from http://www.pdf995.com/ (small licence fee to stop nagging)
- PDFill from http://www.pdfill.com/ (free; small cost for additional PDF editor)
Other Uses of Print to PDF
As well as providing files for easy sharing, printing to PDF provides a way to check the layout of a proposed Table or Tree without actually spending ink and paper. You can simply view the result on-screen and make changes if needed.
It is also possible to produce PDF files for large-format printing. How would you like a big Tree on A0 paper (841 x 1189mm)? Set that paper-size in your PDF printer, produce the file and take it to a local shop that can print it for you. That is, after you have checked it on-screen first, of course.