Opening online files in Mac

kheegster · Post by **kheegster** » 2007-05-20 04:46pm

Everytime I open a PDF file (and certain other file types like PS) through Safari or Firefox on my Mac, it always downloads a copy of the document to my Desktop. Does anyone here know how to stop this? It's annoying to have to get clean up my Desktop after reading papers online.

rhoenix · Post by **rhoenix** » 2007-05-20 08:23pm

What program do your PDF files open in? (Preview? Acrobat Reader?)

What is your default download folder set to in Safari and Firefox?

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2007-05-20 08:47pm

rhoenix wrote:What program do your PDF files open in? (Preview? Acrobat Reader?)

What is your default download folder set to in Safari and Firefox?

Safari and FireFox both default to downloading files to the desktop.

If you set them to download files to another folder, they'll go there instead of the desktop.

thejester · Post by **thejester** » 2007-05-20 08:57pm

I have to deliberately save my PDFs, otherwise they just open in a new tab.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2007-05-20 09:17pm

Firefox PC defaults to open-in-browser (a fucking slow as shit bullshit lameness suck) and Firefox Mac seems to default to save-to-desktop (which, unless you don't like things on your desktop, is better). Really, does Firefox have to go into a fit and almost crash while it's trying to open a pdf in-browser?

rhoenix · Post by **rhoenix** » 2007-05-20 09:38pm

Praxis wrote:
rhoenix wrote:What program do your PDF files open in? (Preview? Acrobat Reader?)

What is your default download folder set to in Safari and Firefox?
Safari and FireFox both default to downloading files to the desktop.

If you set them to download files to another folder, they'll go there instead of the desktop.

Basically yes, without knowing kheegster's response, that would be my normal solution - set both Safari and Firefox to both save downloaded files somewhere else than the Desktop.

I have all PDF's open for me in Preview, and I've grown to prefer it over having it open in-browser, unless it can be seamless to the end user (in this case, me). I've not observed such a thing be seamless yet.

EDIT: Clarified point of view of last paragraph

Resinence · Post by **Resinence** » 2007-05-20 11:28pm

Stark wrote:Firefox PC defaults to open-in-browser (a fucking slow as shit bullshit lameness suck) and Firefox Mac seems to default to save-to-desktop (which, unless you don't like things on your desktop, is better). Really, does Firefox have to go into a fit and almost crash while it's trying to open a pdf in-browser?

Grab the PDF Download plugin, OP should too. You can "open at location" and it just saves it to temp.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2007-05-20 11:31pm

Isn't there a switch? Modding software to introduce sensible features = failure. The Mac version seems to default to download, why can't I make the PC one do the same thing? And why is it even a feature when it almost strangles itself trying to open the file before it's been downloaded? Why does it use Adobe (horribly slow to load bloatware) instead of a cut-down 'just show me the fucking PDF thanks' function? Every time I accidentally click on a link to a pdf I have to roll my eyes and wait for Firefox to become responsive again so I can close the tab and save it instead.

Durandal · Post by **Durandal** » 2007-05-21 01:56am

Safari in Tiger should simply display PDF files inline. If you're using an earlier version of OS X, install either the PDF viewer plug-in or Adobe Reader.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2007-05-21 02:45am

I use Firefox, and I prefer the files to be saved for me to open later, as they are on Mac Firefox in my experience.

Praxis · Post by **Praxis** » 2007-05-21 03:17am

Maybe you have to install Adobe Acrobat Reader for the in-page PDFs?

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2007-05-21 03:19am

Praxis wrote:Maybe you have to install Adobe Acrobat Reader for the in-page PDFs?

Good point, I don't have Acrobat on the Mac since I can already open PDFs without it and it sucks. I guess I could edit the PC Firefox file types MIME thing to stop it using Acrobat?

Bounty · Post by **Bounty** » 2007-05-21 03:28am

The Mac version seems to default to download, why can't I make the PC one do the same thing?

Look under Preferences->Content for the File Types dialog, then change PDF from "open with plugin" to "download".

kheegster · Post by **kheegster** » 2007-05-21 06:16pm

rhoenix wrote:What program do your PDF files open in? (Preview? Acrobat Reader?)

What is your default download folder set to in Safari and Firefox?

I'm on Tiger OS/X 10.4, and using Acrobat with Firefox.

What I really want is to not have anything downloaded to my computer (Desktop or otherwise) when I just want to read a PDF document online (if I want to actually download it, I'd just save it directly). Often, I'm just searching for some bit of info and clicking on multiple PDFs to see if they what I need, so I don't want to clutter up my computer with files which turned out to be useless.

rhoenix · Post by **rhoenix** » 2007-05-21 06:24pm

kheegster wrote:What I really want is to not have anything downloaded to my computer (Desktop or otherwise) when I just want to read a PDF document online (if I want to actually download it, I'd just save it directly). Often, I'm just searching for some bit of info and clicking on multiple PDFs to see if they what I need, so I don't want to clutter up my computer with files which turned out to be useless.

Well, what I normally do is have all downloaded files automatically saved to my ~/user/Download folder, and I delete all files in there about every week or so. The only reason I haven't set up a task schedule for a script that'll wipe out *.pdf in that directory at 3:00am every morning is because I do tend to re-read the .pdf files I get - for my use, that would be ill-advised and dangerous. However, for your requirements it sounds like a good idea.

As for opening PDF files inline with the browser, as my post earlier said, I don't use Firefox on my Mac because though it doesn't have add-ons, Camino is a stripped-down and fast-loading version of Firefox. In Camino, I simply set all PDF files to open in Preview (rather than Adobe's Acrobat Reader, which is slow and irritating to use compared to Preview), and Apple-Q when I'm done reading works for my use.

However, for Firefox, the PDF Download add-on, with the Adobe plug-in installed, works reasonably well. However, in my experience, it's still slower than opening externally with Preview.

EDIT: Addressed inline opening of PDF files