In my continuing series of helpful hints (yes it’s sporadic… I’ve been busy), here is part one of a very underused app in Apple’s default arsenal – Preview.

Many of you may be aware that the Preview app can open jpegs, PDFs, and other assorted pictures.  But did you know that it has a lot of features that used to be Adobe Reader Pro only, such as Shrink PDF, and delete/move/add PDF pages?  

Here’s a breakdown of some of the more common requests:

Shrink PDFs

This is by far the biggest request to be able to do.  Luckily Preview handles this with ease.

1. In the document choose File –> Export (or in earlier versions “Save As”)
2. Under the Quartz Filter drop down choose “Reduce File Size”.  This will reduce it by 70-80% with general JPEG quality pictures.
3. Save the document.  Or if you wish to keep the original choose Export or Save As.

Grab a page from a PDF (or a few)

Sometimes you just want to grab a single page from a deck (or a few) and send them to the clients.  You can do this simply by bringing up the sidebar.

1. On the Window menu bar, select the “Thumbnails” option (the second button in the group of 4).  This will bring up the sidebar showing thumbnails of all the pages.
2. Select the page you want to grab.  If you want to grab a range choose the first page, hold down the shift key and then elect the last page you want to delete.  If you want to grab a section of items not concurrent, hold down the command key and choose what items you want to grab.
3. Drag the elected pages to the desktop.  This will create a new PDF document with those pages in the order they were in the original PDF document.

Delete a page from a PDF (or a few)

Sometimes you just want to delete a single page from a deck (or a few).  You can do this simply by bringing up the sidebar.

1. On the Window menu bar, select the “Thumbnails” option (the second button in the group of 4).  This will bring up the sidebar showing thumbnails of all the pages.
2. Select the page you want to delete.  If you want to delete a range choose the first page, hold down the shift key and then elect the last page you want to delete.  If you want to delete a section of items not concurrent, hold down the command key and choose what items you want to delete.
3. Hit the delete key on the keyboard
4. Save the document.  Or if you wish to keep the original choose Export or Save As.

Rearrange a page from a PDF (or a few)

Sometimes you just want to move around a single page from a deck (or a few).  Again.  Preview has this option.  You can do it in the side bar view that was shown in the previous two examples, but there is an easier way.

1. On the Window menu bar, elect the “contact sheet” option (the last of the 4 buttons).
2. Select the page you want to move.  If you want to grab a range choose the first page, hold down the shift key and then elect the last page you want to delete.  If you want to grab a section of items not concurrent, hold down the command key and choose what items you want to grab.
3. Drag the items to the desired location in the order.  Note the page # will stay the same until you save to make it easier to identify which page is which.
4. Save the document.  Or if you wish to keep the original choose Export or Save As.

Add New Page(s) to a PDF

Every so often you want to put in new pages, or even combine two (or more) different PDfs together.  Preview can help you out with that too!

1. Open all the PDFs that you want to combine.
2. On the Window menu bar, select the “Thumbnails” or “Contact Sheet” options (spending on how many pages you are moving both options can be useful.  You’ll need to do this both on the source PDF file and the Destination PDF file.
3. Select the page you want to move.  If you want to grab a range choose the first page, hold down the shift key and then elect the last page you want to delete.  If you want to grab a section of items not concurrent, hold down the command key and choose what items you want to grab.
4. Drag them to the sidebar/contact list location on the other document.  Note the page # will stay the same as the one form the original PDF file until you save to make it easier to identify which page is which.
5. Repeat this with each additional document you want to add.

1. Open the PDF you will be adding the file(s) to.
2. On the window menu bar, chose either “contact sheet” or “thumbnail” option.
3. Navigate to the spot you want to add the additional PDF documents
4. From the finder, drag the PDF document into the space on the sidebar/contact sheet.
5. Save the document.  Or if you wish to keep the original choose Export or Save As.