Today, the concept of converting, or converting files from one format to another, is quite common. True, not everyone imagines what a conversion is, by what principles it is performed. Let's try to consider this issue on the example of the universal PDF format, which today is one of the most common for documents of various types.
Basics of the concept: what is conversion
Based on, so to speak, technical terms, one can say that the conversion is really a translation, or the conversion of one format to another. True, here the concept “format translation" is misleading. Some, due to their inexperience, believe that file conversion is carried out simply when renaming, changing its extension (letters after the separation point) to another.
Absolutely wrong! Not only does this renaming have nothing to do with conversion, it’s also impossible to open a newly received file either in the program associated with this extension or in the “native” application.
If we talk about what conversion is, you need to clearly understand that this is a process in which the so-called logical-structural content of data (information) is fully or partially preserved.
In addition, there are two types of conversion: conversion from file to file and changing the format "on the fly." The second option is most often found in export or import data operations.
Common conversion programs
For the correct transformation of the structure of any document or file, special utilities called converters are used. They can also be divided into types: narrowly targeted and universal. It is clear that in the first case, such programs are focused exclusively on several similar formats.
In the second, the functional set includes a larger list of data types that are significantly different and do not belong to the same class, but such universality often casts doubt on the quality of the file obtained during the conversion process.
Now we will start from the PDF format as the most universal for office documents, which may contain text, graphics, or other structures from the multimedia field.
Convert to PDF Text Files
The simplest processes include converting text to PDF. We do not consider standard text files created, say, in Notepad. Take the most common DOC format that corresponds to the Microsoft Word application. Data conversion here can be done in several ways.
The first and easiest way is to use regular save. When you select the "Save As ..." command, a window appears in which the type of data to be saved is indicated below. It is enough to click on the drop-down list and select from it a field indicating the type of PDF document, indicated in brackets by the extension .pdf.
Such a function, however, is present only in office suites of 2010 and higher. Otherwise, converting a Word document to PDF involves the use of additional plug-ins that are embedded in the Word shell.
One of these is the Save as PDF or XPS utility, developed by the same Microsoft Corporation. After its installation in the menu of formats at saving and the corresponding field will appear.
These two options, by the way, relate to what is called on-the-fly conversion. For direct conversion, you can use many converter programs, for example, Solid Converter PDF or Word to PDF Converter. The first program is more preferable because it can perform the conversion in both forward and reverse directions. In other words, this is a direct conversion to PDF of a Word document and the reverse from PDF to DOC format.
Convert PDF to Word document
As just said, the above utility will do. You can also use converters such as PDF2Word Converter, there is not much difference.
PDF to Word conversion is performed using the same algorithms. By and large, this is especially not important, because the main thing is the result.
However, it is believed that the best way to convert is to use Adobe Reader. In it, by analogy with Word, there is also a “Save As ...” command and a list of supported extensions and document types. Simply select a Word document, after which the conversion will be performed on the fly.
Here you can use another simple way. It is enough to select the entire fragment or structure in the PDF document, copy it to the clipboard, and then paste it into the Word text editor to save. True, the disadvantage of this method is sometimes a violation of the structure or formatting of the document. But still, both methods are good, although the second is not even converting PDF to Word, but simply copying the data. It is because of this that problems can arise.
Convert drawings and images to PDF and vice versa
In general, all the information that we perceive visually, by and large, can be converted into a PDF format. And graphics are no exception.
For such conversions, as a rule, specialized utilities are used that have names such as JPEG to PDF Converter, Image to PDF Converter, etc. The processing process is identical to that used in the case of office documents. By analogy, any program for converting in terms of the inverse transformation also works.
Again, in many cases, you can use your own capabilities of Adobe Reader, only from the menu of formats in this case the graphic file type is selected.
Online Services Features
Finally, if someone is too lazy to engage in such conversions manually, please - on the Internet today there are a fairly large number of online converters. Using them will not be difficult. Upload your file to a specific resource, determine the direction of conversion with the choice of the final format and activate the conversion process. The file obtained after a few minutes is simply stored on the computer’s hard drive.
Conclusion
Here, in fact, everything on the question of “what is conversion”, and what are the simplest methods for doing it. If you recommend something, it’s worth saying that it’s better to spend a couple of minutes installing the appropriate utilities or finding portable versions that do not require installation than using online services, because the result may not be exactly what you expected. But this applies more to work with graphics, which must be converted to PDF.
As for text documents, here you can perfectly manage only with Word and Adobe Reader. As the saying goes, why reinvent the wheel? Moreover, the result here is known in advance. As practice shows, it is often much better than even using converters to directly convert formats. Actually, even in the work, such a technique looks much simpler. The only thing required is the installation of Adobe Reader, if one is not available on the computer, or the plug-in for Microsoft Word (again, if the version of the text editor was released earlier than 2010).