Saturday, January 7, 2012

How to Share a PDF in Blogger

The past few months, as I've been blogging (and reading blogs), I realized that I needed more internet savvy skills than I possessed. Two things that I wanted to do were to "Make a picture into a link" and to post downloadable PDF's on my blog. Several blogs that I really admire and that inspired my little venture here, share lots of these. I think it is so cool and definitely attractive and interesting to readers!

I found great directions, HERE, on creating a picture link. Beware, it involves editing HTML code. I found this utterly fascinating, something that a couple of my high school buddies (Jeffrey and Josh) would get a huge kick out of now. In physics class, we used to debate why organizations like NASA were spending billions and trillions on space exploration. My platform was that space travel is a waste, why not just admire the moon and stars from here? They were champions of things like understanding the mysteries of space and the internet. I confess, I now appreciate HTML code, but I still think we should spend the space money on something like America's monstrous debt...



Here's how I share a PDF in Blogger
(I'm sure it's just one of many ways):

You need two things:
1) A gmail account. Although possibly yahoo and some of the others now have document capabilities, try it out, if it works post it in a comment!
2) A PDF file of your own making to share.

Step One
Sign in to your gmail account, click on "Documents" in the toolbar.
***Note: Google changed the setup so that all Google Docs has a new home. Now you sign in to your
      gmail account and click on "Drive" in the toolbar. After that all my directions below are the same.

Click the "Upload" button (just to the right of the "Create" button) and select "File...". Select the document you want to upload, choose "Start Upload" then you will see this.



Step Two
Click on the file to open it (when you wave your cursor over the file name, you'll see that it's a link). After opening, there will be a blue "Share" button in the right hand corner. Click on it and a little box with "Sharing Settings" will appear. The default setting is "Private, only the people listed below can access" with an option to "Change" beside it. Click Change.



Step Three
You will now see another menu with several options (below). Choose "Anyone with the link," and click "save."

Now, the moment we've all been waiting for!! A URL will appear. You can copy and paste the URL into any kind of link you want, simple text or in a picture link. You always have the option to go back to the same file (in Google Documents), open your document and choose "Share" to find the URL again or to make changes to share settings.





Step Four (creating a picture link in Blogger)
If you decide to do a picture link, upload the picture into blogger then click "Edit HTML." Sorry, couldn't resist this picture, it's the funniest thing I've ever seen. Baby P a year ago!


After you click "Edit HTML," a whole bunch of this will show up... It is the HTML code that describes the image above.

<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFX5fTGwqW0CgecPFilOw-yhD198dXfrs86axucY0c2HR2J1vYhkkqJLDmTjmQ0nmx428_Qunw7agVjMcCyFH5nWo6BqdQtukoGD6nwrvUUuUFtEdv8nj6Udluxxsz7Vg9eaAf3s0gSTQ/s1600/029+-+Copy+%25286%2529.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="250" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFX5fTGwqW0CgecPFilOw-yhD198dXfrs86axucY0c2HR2J1vYhkkqJLDmTjmQ0nmx428_Qunw7agVjMcCyFH5nWo6BqdQtukoGD6nwrvUUuUFtEdv8nj6Udluxxsz7Vg9eaAf3s0gSTQ/s320/029+-+Copy+%25286%2529.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>


The first URL (highlighted in yellow) is the one we are interested in, it is a link. By default the picture links to itself. If you click on that picture it will just take you to a page showing the picture alone, maybe with a few other pictures from this post. Try it. But...if you substitute your own URL for the highlighted URL (see teal highlighted below and be sure to keep the quotation marks) clicking the picture can take you wherever you want.

Below is the HTML for a picture link that will take you to the PDF I uploaded in Google Docs. I also added the HTML to open the PDF in a new window (highlighted in purple). Once you're done editing HTML, click "Compose" and that's it.





<a href="https://docs.google.com/open?id=0B_hV7G1vVKjjYTA4MzYxMjQtYmUwZC00NDUwLTg3NTEtYmM1ZDNhNzRlMWQ4"  target=”_blank” imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="250" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFX5fTGwqW0CgecPFilOw-yhD198dXfrs86axucY0c2HR2J1vYhkkqJLDmTjmQ0nmx428_Qunw7agVjMcCyFH5nWo6BqdQtukoGD6nwrvUUuUFtEdv8nj6Udluxxsz7Vg9eaAf3s0gSTQ/s320/029+-+Copy+%25286%2529.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>





Here's a picture link that will take you to "Before the Throne of God" melody PDF in a new window.
It's not so bad! Those of you who are reading this and have real training in the codewriting arena have probably noted that I do not :). Please, don't be shy about making suggestions! 

P.S. If you found this helpful, link back and leave a comment! Thanks!


48 comments:

  1. Just what I needed to start sharing through my own blog! Thank you so much!

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  2. I'm prepping a workshop for teachers on using our school's blog, and found this helpful!

    BTW, if we used ALL of this year's NASA budget to help pay off the debt, it would only cover about a tenth of a percent of the current debt. We'd have to spend the whole NASA budget almost one thousand times to erase the current budget!

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  3. thank you, thank you! needed this for a scheduled post and now I finally know how to do it.

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  4. Thank you for your tips! Just what I needed in a pinch and a rush!

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  5. From one mama blogger to another - Thank you very much!! ~RH from "Dirt Don't Hurt" (2corinthians1311.blogspot.com)

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  6. Thank you so much for the tutorial. Without your help, I won't be able to share the oven manual which in pdf format in my blog post for the benefit of my visitors. Appreciate it very much. Thank you.

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  7. Thank you for the Tutorial. Especially that you put the screens I would be seeing in the blog. For some reason my Documents come up in Slovian. So I followed it by looking at the screen shots. I was able to save the PDF in my draft for my blog. As a added bonus, I was also able to change from Slovien to English while in there by following the screen shots!

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  8. Good Morning. My Name is Giovani dos Santos, i'am Brazilian. Thank you for your post, i looking for this and i found here. Thanks you and good luck!

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  9. good morning i anant mali police inspecter india thanks fof u r use ful tips for my blog updates

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  10. Thank you so much for the pdf instructions. Very easy to follow! And oh my stars that is THE cutest baby picture ever! LOL

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  11. Thanks Chelsea this was really helpful in publishing my first knitting pattern on Ravelry!

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  12. I just used your information to help me add a free embroidery pattern on my blog, THANK YOU so much! (From one very NOT computer savvy person!)

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  13. I do have a problem as my toolbar does not have a document option in gmail. I do have You+, Search, Image, Maps, etc... Would Google have changed that option? Thank you.

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    1. Thanks for the comment. I checked it out and the new home for Google Docs is "Drive," you should have that option at the top of the screen after signing into your gmail account. Then you can just follow the directions above after that.

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    2. I appreciate your good gesture of sharing important things.

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  14. Thank you so much!! :)) Great help for like me who's a beginner :)

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  15. I just maxed out my pages, so I was super excited to see this article...thanks!

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  16. Really well done. This was clear and easy to understand. Just what I needed. ;) Thanks so much and Happy New Year!!!

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  17. Thanks! This is great! Very easy to follow!

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  18. Thanks a lot!!! I almost gave it up. But your instructions helped me to find my way to put pdfs into blogger. After all I wrote a similar post in German
    http://fadenspielundfingerwerk.blogspot.de/2013/01/wie-bringe-ich-ein-pdf-in-meinen-blog_14.html
    and put in a link to your post.

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  19. Yay - thanks for this! I am planning on using it in a post on Monday. Will certainly include a link back if (when!) it works.

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  20. thanks for the tip. it was useful.

    cute pic!

    have a great day.

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  21. Thank you. I am new to blogging and wanted to post a PDF. Your post was great. Much easy to find it for help than how I struggled with my blog-maker. And much more understandable than Google.

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  22. Your post just saved my life! Well, that's perhaps an overstatement, but I seriously think I might have just crumpled into a big messy, snotty heap and given up if I hadn't found this. Thank you for thinking that other people might find it useful too!

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  23. Thanks! That was really helpful. I plan on including pdf documents in my blog that I am calling "fridgeables" (things you can put on the fridge to help you navigate situations in life). In my first post I will be sure to give you link back credit. I appreciate it when someone includes screen shots and details like you did. Thanks, Judi

    www.judifox.com

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  24. Your instructions were very easy to follow. However, when the Google Drive saved it as a PDF, some of the details were lost/changed. I have a table in my PDF file, where some of the cells have a background color. Those colors just disappeared, and it's all white. Do you have any idea how to fix that?

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    Replies
    1. Jessica, I suggest saving your Doc as a PDF before uploading if it's changing details. I've had that problem before with formatting when going between a Word doc (for example) straight to Google Docs. You probably already know how to do this, but just go to "Save As" in whatever program you're using and choose "PDF." Then all your colors, etc... are permanent so that when you upload to Google Drive they won't change. I think it will fix your problem.

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  25. Hi Chelsea!

    This was a very helpful post, so thank you so much for sharing and making many of our lives easier. I do have a question regarding privacy, though. Do you know if it's possible to just make the PDF viewable as opposed to downloadable? I'm sharing my writing samples (from magazines, etc.) and I really just want viewers to be able to read the text without downloading and potentially redistributing elsewhere... any thoughts?

    Thanks again!

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    Replies
    1. Hi Rachel, I've been trying to figure out how to make these files viewable only, so far no luck...other people are asking the same question though. I'll keep trying, if you find out before I do I would love to hear about it!

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  26. Thankyou. This was exactly what I was looking for to add to my next post :)

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  28. Thanks for this post, it was really useful! ^_^

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  29. I tried a few other instructions on how to do this, but couldn't follow. Your post has been so helpful! I was stymied with my blog for the past 2 years wanting/needing to figure this out. (I want to be able to post pdf's for sewing project templates.) Now I am ready to proceed again. Thank you! :D

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  30. thanx alot..was trying for it since along today only could do it...thanx a ton

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  31. Thank you so much for your very clear, and concise explanations. I wish I would have found your blog 2 hours ago. Woo Hoo! So glad to finally know how to do this.

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  32. Thank you once again for the clear tutorial. I've followed your tutorial last year (September 29, 2012) when I wanted to upload my oven's manual and today, I've followed your same tutorial (but on a different link) to upload my breadmaker's manual and recipe book. I've linked back to your websites... sewBOLD and also Staying Steyn. It is surely a great help to me. Take care....

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  33. Great article. Thanks for the info. Does anyone know where I can find a blank "share pdf document" to fill out?

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    1. This comment has been removed by the author.

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    3. Hey Elielou, I found a blank fillable "share pdf document" here: http://goo.gl/yoGwr2

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  34. I totally agree with the all questions you raised. I think it could also be useful for everyone to know how and where to merge documents online. You will be surprised how easy it can be to merge some documents. Try to merge your files through the online sowtware altomerge.com.

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  35. nice post. thanks for share.Hallow viewer now I introduce you infix PDF Editor pro 6.38 If is a PDF editor Software. You can image and page in PDF file when using the PDF Editor infix. PDF editor quickly edit text in yours PDF you can change text fonts, color, border, extrusions thickness etc. We unit then or add page numbering most of PDF files haze restricted crossed to convert the data in a text. PDF editor pro is a update software. without that for new video editor, photo editor software just visit
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