About PDF files

Why are PDF files used on this website?

PDF (Portable Document Format) files are used extensively on this website, for several reasons.

• PDF is the global standard format for distributing files;
• PDF files can be opened and viewed by everyone (by downloading the free Acrobat Reader software mentioned below), regardless of what type of computer or software they are using. For example, if a file is originally created in the latest version of Microsoft Word, people using an older version of Word, or different word processing software such as Wordperfect or Lotus WordPro, may not be able to open the file. They can however open a PDF file;
• The PDF format preserves the original look of a document almost exactly, so that tables, photos and layout all appear as they do in the original. We can therefore make publications such as our Change Your World newsletter available online;

How do I get the software I need to read PDF files?

The software required is called Adobe Acrobat Reader. You can download it for free .

Other information

As with any software, there are different versions of Adobe Acrobat Reader available. In order to make PDF files widely accessible, as far as possible files on this site will be compatible with versions 3.0 and above. However, it is generally worth downloading the latest version of Adobe Acrobat Reader.

PDF files larger than 50 kilobytes (k) on this site will have their size given in brackets. This gives you some idea of how long the file will take to download before clicking on it. As a rough guide, a 56.6K modem may download files at around 6K a second.

If you are visually impaired, extra help for working with PDF files is available at access.adobe.com.