CutePDF

Many people need to generate PDF files occasionally, but it can be an expensive proposition to get the latest version of Adobe Acrobat for every user in your office to create basic PDF files. Acrobat comes with many wonderful features for create sophisticated PDF files. Digital signing, encryption and forms that post to web servers are among a few that Timewarp Technologies uses Acrobat for. However, when all you need is get some pages from some unusual program and provide the results to a user without the ability to read the source or resulting files, PDF is a great solution. For that matter, if the end consumer should not be modifying the document, I highly recommend sending PDF instead of Word documents as they are safer and more robust.

Enter CutePDF Writer:

http://www.cutepdf.com/Products/CutePDF/writer.asp

This handy program will allow you to "print" to the CutePDF printer and save the result as a PDF you can then send along to your end consumer. Simple, powerful and best of all, free.

Free? Why free? Well, CutePDF uses Ghostscript, an open source (and itself free) postscript manipulation program as the conversion tool. The company provides more powerful tools that build upon CutePDF which are all quite affordable as well, but the print to PDF functionality remains a free product that does everything the average user will ever need. If you do need additional functionality, try the companies affordable CutePDF product:

http://www.cutepdf.com/Products/CutePDF/plus.asp

Both are highly recommended. Of course, if you need the most advanced PDF features only Acrobat will do:

http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobatpro/main.html