A newbie question

I may be too dense to understand the answer that may already be in FAQ, but is there a way to paste a pdf into the message body? I see some schematics in others' posts. They have some resolution artifacts on screen but seem to print out ok.

Brad

> a way to paste a pdf into the message body?

No.

You can however provide a link to a PDF.

> I see some schematics in others' posts.

GIF and JPEG images can be put in a message. A well-tuned GIF is a great way to show a schematic without JPEG jaggy or PDF bloat.

thanks. Bloat is a techincal term ;-)?

> Bloat is a techincal term ;-)?

PDF can do MUCH more than just being an inline image. And it carries all that fat around with it.

If you have a nice PDF, and want to put the image in a message, rip it to GIF. In newer PDF readers, there is a Select Graphic tool that can put a selection on the clipboard as an image. Start an image editor and paste the clipboard into a new image. Save it as an image file on a public webserver.

Fine shades of color, like photographs of naked people or capacitors, work best as JPEG images. JPEG tries to compress the image without losing eye-detail. Line-drawings like high-contrast schematics work best as GIF: the compression is adapted to fewer colors but GIF does not try to "blend" the way JPEG does.

Here is a hasty clip from a PDF that I had handy:


PDF file

I ran into a problem. Some PDF files do NOT let you copy out of them. The Author can set a "No-Copy" flag. (This is part of the "bloat" that comes with PDF structure.) In that case, use Windows' "Ctrl-PrntScrn" keystroke (similar on Mac) to grab the whole screen, paste it into an image editor, and crop it down.