ScanTo Office, $49.99
PDF Transformer, $49.99
For Windows 98 and up
Abbyy Software House
www.abbyyusa.com
These two programs from one of the world’s biggest digital document-processing companies share a goal–to speed up the process of scanning text into PCs and to do the same for users who need to extract stuff from PDF files.
If this sounds mundane, you are correct. But using this software for even a short while greatly increased this reviewer’s use of his often-dormant scanner.
With ScanTo Office, your copy of Microsoft Word, Excel and Outlook adds a scanning command to the file menu, making it very easy to scan a stack of printed pages into a single word-processing file, spreadsheet or e-mail. You don’t need to scan page by page, converting each into a document and then clipping and pasting each separately.
This is a welcome spur to action for procrastinators who pile up magazine articles, letters and other stuff, waiting to find the time to turn them into computer-readable text.
Which brings up the second program, PDF Transformer. It reads the Adobe portable document format and converts all contents into Word files, complete with frames, photos and illustrations.
It has become commonplace to find documents on Web sites, such as those run by the U.S. government and many state and local institutions, in this format. They must be downloaded and read by the Adobe Reader software that most Web users have as plug-ins to their browsers.
By sucking the content into the familiar Microsoft Office documents, the Transformer simplifies snipping stuff from PDFs and putting it into an editable format.
The dynamic duo from Abbyy makes this stuff useable.
WILEY PRESS
Got a smart phone? Here’s how to use it
The affluent and afflicted minority who have bought mobile phones that include a computer operating system–i.e., smart phones–can find enlightenment in Wiley Press’ new “101 Cool Smartphone Techniques” (349 pages, $24.99 at www.wiley.com).
Sixty of these hybrid phones are covered. That’s because regardless of the brand name, all run the Series 60 operating system, with bells and whistles like swapping files with computers, playing music, snapping photos, flirting via IM and watching small movie files.
In just a few pages for each phone, author Dean Andrews delivers the kind of hand-holding few user’s manuals approach.
LOGITECH
Laser-toting mouse hops to top of class
Sitting in its oval-shaped charging cradle, Logitech’s MX1000 Laser Cordless Mouse looks like somebody messed up a green Easter egg. Fire it up, however, and you’ll think that some bunny likes you.
Using a small laser instead of the red optical sensors in other wireless wonders, the MX1000 can work on just about any surface, and its precision is breathtaking if you’re the type whose breathing is affected by great gadgets.
