Searching PDFs on the Internet

Adobe Reader provides you with a link for searching PDF documents on the Internet. Rather than open a Web browser and search for keywords that return HTML documents, the search you perform in Reader returns only PDF documents hosted on Web sites containing keywords you use in your search criteria.

Why is searching PDFs on the Internet helpful?

You can search keywords in PDF documents on the Internet and download files locally to your hard drive. For research projects, you can collect an archive of files that are easily accessible and searchable with Adobe Reader search. By using the advanced search features in Adobe Reader, you can quickly and easily find the precise information you want from a collection of PDF documents.

To search PDF files on the Internet:

1.	Press Ctrl/Command+Shift+F to open the Search pane.
2.	Click Search the internet using Yahoo! (Figure 7.16). Note that the option to search PDFs on the Internet appears in both the Basic and Advanced Search windows. Figure 7.16. Click Search the internet using Yahoo!.
3.	Type the text you want to search for in the text box as shown in (Figure 7.17). Figure 7.17. Type the word(s) you want to search.
4.	Select the search criteria you want to use from the How precise would you like to make your search? pull-down menu. The options include Match Exact word or phrase, Match Any word or phrase, and Match All of the Words.
5.	Note the new check box option called Search only in PDF files. Click the check box.
6.	Click Search the Internet. Your default Web browser launches and takes you to the Yahoo.com Web site, where all the search results are reported as HTML links to PDF documents.
7.	Click a link on the Web page and a PDF file opens in your Web browser. In Figure 7.18 the links are displayed on the Yahoo Web page. Figure 7.18. Click a Web link, and the file that opens is a PDF document.

Can I search a specific Web site for PDF documents?

You can use Yahoo.com or Google.com to search PDF documents. However, to use a search engine other than Yahoo, you need to launch the search engine in your Web browser. Adobe Reader only supports Yahoo directly from within Reader.

If you want to use Google.com, you need to type the following in the search text box:

"Adobe Reader" site:http://www.adobe.com filetype:pdf

Note: The URL is preceded and followed by a space.

This example will match the search words Adobe Reader using Match exact word or phrase (exact word or phrase is used when you place the search words within quotation marks) on the Adobe.com Web site and ask for only pdf files to be returned in the results. The first part of the string contains the search words, the second part contains the Web site, and the third part the filetype.

Both Yahoo and Google offer you advanced search options that let you restrict your search to a specific Web site by clicking an Advanced Search link. In Yahoo the link appears directly below the text box where you add your search criteria. In Google, the link appears to the right of the text box where you type search criteria. Using Yahoo as an example, click the Advanced Search link, and the Advanced Search Web page opens (Figure 7.19). You can limit your search criteria by making choices in the text boxes and selecting menu options. In the Site/Domain category, click only search in this domain/site and type the domain name you want to search. If you click Yahoo Search, the reported results will be PDF documents meeting the search criteria hosted on the selected domain.

Figure 7.19. Click Advanced Search on the Yahoo.com Web page to open the Advanced Search options window.