how to choose a pen for important occasion

[An old bloke]

You can do that in Adobe Reader.

[Robert]

I had the same question several years ago when I executed my (gulp!) Last Will and Testament. The pen I chose was one of my oldest and most loved: the Montblanc 149 I purchased new in the mid-1970's. I used that pen to take notes in law school and write the essay portions of the Texas bar exam. For the will execution I filled the 149 with deAtramentis dark blue document ink.

[Cyril]

You could use the pen as a stick to press the keys on your keyboard as you type your signature.

Nah. Mac has this cool thing where you take a picture of your signature and it will embed it into a pdf.

That picture was taken years ago and i will likely not update it. Also it’s b/w only :/

Oh by the way , we are in the millennial era. So living in the top of the tech. We can do anything. all we need a A palm reader gadget ( i Phone or we phone or You phone ) and an App from the famous Free-lunch apple store.
Beware ...Not anything from the Peach store they are spammers.
Then put the brain sells to a rest and get all answers flexed and life trouble free. Have more phone chargers handy.

[INeedAFinancialAdvisor]

You can do that in Adobe Reader.

yes, you probably can, but I DESPISE adobe as a company to a level I CANNOT explain. (but I'll try...)

(incoming rant)

I will NOT pay for Adobe software and when possible, I will avoid using it (CS6 is nice. but I sure as heck didn't pay for it, and never would)
And if I HAVE to use adobe reader (for why I would "have to", read on) I will IMMEDIATELY delete it after its use.

Adobe are the very definition of lack of ethics

Here's why:

ever try and open a pdf and get:
"Please wait...

if this message is not eventually replaced with the proper contents of the document...."?

You will have if you don't use Adobe Reader... because Adobe decided to completely screw over every single computer user in the world.
They took the OPEN Pdf standard (https://talkingpdf.org/no-pdf-is-not-owned-by-adobe/) and then inserted their PROPRIETARY XFA crap into it... but of course, they didn't TELL anyone they were doing this. (https://forums.pdfforge.org/t/dynami...ocuments/15597)
And of course they did this only after PDF had become the de-facto standard for business forms

So as businesses and Govts upgraded their Adobe Acrobat software for creating PDFs, the contents of their PDFs were now formatted in XFA, and completely unreadable by any software that is NOT Adobe.

These files are NOT Pdfs, not by any stretch. These files are no more a PDF than a .docx file is if you change it's name to be .pdf!
But no one does anything.
These actions likely border on illegal, and are definitely anti-competitive.
The only entity that COULD do something is a Govt, mostly the US Govt could... They could FORCE Adobe to remove this BS, or make XFA an open standard, but that won't happen and we all know it. I'm more likely to win the lottery without having even bought a ticket, than the US Gov is to punish adobe for this anti-consumer anti-competitive immoral unethical act.

If I am lucky enough to be alive when they fail as a company, I swear to god i'm throwing a party. (and I am deeply anti social/introverted, so that's a big step for me)

every fibre of my being DESPISES that entire company.

One of the least ethical companies in the software world.
Adobe is a GREEDY PARASITE who abuse their users and they can't die fast enough.

yes, I am likely WAY too involved in this, but I am/was a trained computer nerd and programmer. So I care about this stuff.
I understand at a fundament/programming level what they did here, and WHY they did it and it disgusts me and infuriates me.
I am also insanely upset that the ISO, IEEE and Govts haven't DONE something about this!
PDF had its flaws (java script exploits anyone?...) but this? This renders it WORSE than useless.
It takes the entire computer using world hostage.

[An old bloke]

What Win 10 compatible programmes would you suggest in place of Adobe, Acrobat, Reader and Photoshop? I'm here to learn.

[INeedAFinancialAdvisor]

What Win 10 compatible programmes would you suggest in place of Adobe, Acrobat, Reader and Photoshop? I'm here to learn.

admittedly my experience with win10 is limited. (the last time I OWNED a windows machine, it was windows 7, and that was almost a decade ago) But as I recall I used to use a program called foxit for reading pdfs on my Win10 machine at work (until I formatted it and installed linux...)
https://www.foxit.com/pdf-reader/
it seemed ok, pls note, it (like all other programs that are not adobe...) won't read the new fake "pdfs".
Nothing does, and nothing can, that's the entire point of why adobe is pulling this BS.

For MY reading needs, I have a Mac, so the built in Preview app reads and fills them in fine.

For generating PDFs, AFAIK, MS Word still allows export as a PDF, as does Libre Office which is free, and like MSOffice was, before the cursed "ribbon bar"...
Libre is also on linux and Mac, so it's what I use. And these PDFs will actually BE PDFs!
https://www.libreoffice.org

If you're looking to replace Lightroom, apparently Darktable is good. But since they still haven't bothered to implement Apple ProRaw, I have no experience with it, and now that I have upgraded to Big Sur and I have Pixelmator Pro, I have no reason to ever try Darktable again.
https://www.darktable.org

for photoshop... well. there's GIMP... I hate it. Some love it...
I have installed something called the PhotoGIMP package that makes it look and feel more like photoshop, but I have not used it yet. It's on Windows, Mac and Linux, and its free
https://www.gimp.org
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57DNUsf4A-0

and on Mac there is Pixelmator Pro. I bought this just a few days ago. this is the first piece of software I've actually PAID for (other than console video games) in what is likely well over a decade... maybe even two... and for the 30bucks I paid, I think I got my moneys worth. That said, I haven't tried to do anything big with it, nothing like my Vintage Advertising Replication, that was all done in Photoshop CS6. And each of them had dozens of layers and tweaks... I'm not 100% sure Pixelmator will be able to do all of the things, especially the text stuff, that is needed to do one of them. There is, unfortunately, a reason photoshop is the industry leader.
https://fpgeeks.com/forum/showthread...l=1#post326567
https://fpgeeks.com/forum/showthread...l=1#post327602
https://fpgeeks.com/forum/showthread...l=1#post327720
https://fpgeeks.com/forum/showthread...l=1#post328467

This is a good website to help you find alternatives:
https://alternativeto.net

hope this helps.

[calamus]

Congratulations! You've just derailed your own thread.

[junglejim]

Congratulations! You've just derailed your own thread.

One of the benefits with growing old. A short attention spa.... Oh Look! Shinies!!!


PS-- I second the drier ink pen. When I retired I had to sign lots of documents on crappy paper, civilian and government lowest bidder stuff. Used a Mabie-Todd Swan filled with Pelikan Blue-Black that had a medium/fine nib.

[INeedAFinancialAdvisor]

Congratulations! You've just derailed your own thread.

One of the benefits with growing old. A short attention spa.... Oh Look! Shinies!!!


PS-- I second the drier ink pen. When I retired I had to sign lots of documents on crappy paper, civilian and government lowest bidder stuff. Used a Mabie-Todd Swan filled with Pelikan Blue-Black that had a medium/fine nib.

Well if things keep up the way they are going, I’ll manage to complete all the paperwork without actually meeting anyone or signing anything in real life. I’m currently on my second “supervisor” who has never even seen my face. Only emails and phone calls.

[INeedAFinancialAdvisor]

Congratulations! You've just derailed your own thread.

Awesome. I’ll file that away with the rest of the stuff that doesn’t bother me even a little.

Especially since it may hasten the demise of Adobe.