PDFs are one of the most popular file types stored, shared, and accessed in Egnyte. Egnyte’s WebUI supports rich tools for viewing and editing PDF files in the browser.
PDF Viewer
The PDF Viewer is used to preview PDF files within the Web UI and on shared file and folder links. The viewer is also used to preview a variety of other Document and Word Processing, Spreadsheet, and Presentation file types, as covered in Which Types of Files Work With The File Previewer. The viewer and all of its capabilities are available to all Egnyte plans.
If the user has enabled the Microsoft Office integration, many of these file types will preview in the Microsoft Office Online viewer and not the pdf viewer.
Basic Controls
The PDF Viewer allows the user to scroll through a document and navigate a page with an overlay at the bottom of the document.
Clicking the first number in the overlay allows entering a page number, which will navigate the user to that page.
The toolbar at the top of the viewer has controls for opening the left panel, printing, viewing the document in full-screen mode, changing zoom and navigation options. The right side of the toolbar has options for search and annotations.
Search
Clicking on the magnifying glass on the right of the toolbar brings up the search panel. The user can search for a word or phrase and the panel will show a list of matches with surrounding text. Click on a match to scroll the document to that result.
Annotations Panel
The annotations panel is just to the right of search on the toolbar. This panel shows a list of all of the annotations (such as notes and highlights) added to the document and allows the user to search those annotations. Clicking an annotation, scrolls the user to that annotation in the document displaying an arrow symbol pointing to it.
Left Panel
The left panel is accessible via the first item on the toolbar. Clicking the menu item opens and closes the panel. The panel has three tabs:
- Thumbnails – shows thumbnail images of each page in the document. Clicking a thumbnail navigates to that page in the document.
- Outlines – shows the outlines or bookmarks in the document. Note that not all documents are defined with outlines.
- Attachments – shows any files that are attached to the document.
PDF Editing
PDF Editing is an optional add-on to Egnyte plans that provides the ability to add annotations, edit text, manipulate pages, create form fields, and fill out interactive PDFs. The changes made in the editing mode are made directly to the PDF and will be visible in 3rd party PDF viewing and editing applications.
To add PDF Editing to your Egnyte plan, the add-on can be purchased through the Plan Details page or contact an Egnyte sales representative for more details.
Starting the Edit Process
PDF editing is supported when the following criteria are met:
- The document is a PDF
- The user has Editor or greater permissions
- The file is not locked by another user
To begin editing, click the Edit button at the top-right of the PDF Viewer on the top bar.
- Users with editing rights on a PDF can now set lock on the file automatically once they click on ‘Edit’. Once they leave the edit session, the file automatically gets unlocked.
- Only Admins and Folder owners can manually unlock the file from the context menu.
Editing Controls
After starting the editing process, a number of new toolbars will be added to the PDF Viewer that contains 30+ annotation and editing tools. These tools are covered in the following menus:
- Annotate – highlight, add sticky notes, and make freehand drawings on the document
- Shapes – add shapes and arrows to the document
- Insert – insert callouts, images, stamps, and signatures
- Measure – add measurement annotations to capture the size and area of shapes. Use calibration tools to set the scale
- Edit Text – edit and add new text and images to the document
- Fill and Sign – add signatures, stamps, and other marks to a document
- Forms – add text inputs, form controls, and signature locations to a document
Many of these tools support a wide variety of formatting options including colors, stroke width, opacity, and other formatting options.
While in edit mode, the Annotations panel allows changing the status of existing and new annotations, marking them as Accepted, Rejected, Cancelled, and more.
Text Editing
To edit the existing text of a document, click the Edit Text menu. All of the paragraphs and text elements will be surrounded by a dashed line. Double-click a text element or click the border and choose the Edit button to modify the text.
A panel on the right side of the screen allows customizing the formatting of the selected text, including the font, size, alignment, and color. The user can also add hyperlinks to websites.
The Edit Text menu also gives additional options to add new paragraphs and images to the document.
Page Manipulation
PDF Editing also includes the ability to manipulate the pages of a document, including:
- Inserting Pages – merge pages from another PDF or add blank pages
- Deleting Pages – remove a page from the document
- Extracting Pages – save one or more pages as a separate document
- Moving Pages – rearrange the pages in a different order
- Rotating Pages – rotate the page
The user can access these features from the thumbnail panel while editing a PDF and clicking the “…” button under the page.
By default, these actions are performed on single pages.
To perform an action on multiple pages, use the options at the bottom of the thumbnail panel to provide a list of pages (for example “2-4” and “2, 3, 5, 9”) and select the action to perform to the pages.
Saving your Edits
After making the edits to the document, the user can save the changes. On clicking the Save button in the top-right, two choices will be displayed:
- Save - this creates a new version of the PDF file.
- Save As – this creates a new file and gives you the option to choose the new file name and the location for the file.