PDFpen 6.0 Adds Word Export
The latest version of PDFpen, Smile’s PDF manipulation software, adds the capability to export a PDF to Microsoft Word format, supports Auto Save and Versions, adds an editing bar for quick access to common tools, and can print annotations at the end of a document.
For a couple of years, Smile Software has licensed a separate edition of PDFpen Pro for the same price as PDFpen Pro with (all?) the 'new' features of v.6, like convert-to-Word, thus offering more features at the same price as PDFpen Pro. This app was (and apparently still is) sold by Nuance Corp under the name Nuance PDF Converter for Mac. This new PDFpen Pro version seems merely to offer the features of the older Nuance product.
That said, I look forward to using PDFpen Pro 6, which I just purchased today at the sale price. But I don't know how much work really went into this version, and how much Smile is working on updating it right now...
A couple points are worth clarifying: Nuance's PDF Converter for Mac is not available in the Mac App Store, so it doesn't have iCloud access. None of the other new features in PDFpenPro version 6 are available in the Nuance product at this time. In other words, quite a lot of work went into this version, and we hope you'll find it a worthy upgrade. - Jean MacDonald/Smile
Just bought it, using my TidBITS discount to get an extra sweet deal. I can't get Export to Word to work at all. Relaunching, rebooting, nothing happens. I have a document I really want to try it on right away. Guess I'll be putting in a support request.
Bummer, sorry to hear it! Apart from the initial hiccup that I'm blaming on the license agreement dialog, I had no trouble with any of a number of test exports, but the Smile support folks have been great in my experience.
Word from Smile is that this is a known problem with Lion, OS X 10.7. They're working on a fix.
PDFPen 5 was able to save to and open from iCloud using PDFPen iCloud Access. Unfortunately, double-clicking a document in the Cloud with this app opens it in Preview, not in Smile-purchased v.6.
Yes, I think Apple didn't want Smile to do the PDFpen iCloud Access app any more.
So much for buying it in the MAS when I could have used my Tidbits discount and buying direct. :(
I was also a bit surprised to also find the older version had been removed! I found it in the Trash, so all was not lost. Plus, I usually make a zipped copy of any app I'm updating, anyway. I initially had problems with the dialogs urging that I pay for the app; they kept re-appearing after I clicked the "Cancel" button. I had a very good email conversation with 'Johnathan' and his suggestion to re-download (I'm using the Smile, not MAS version) worked fine. I think the original problem was due to te old app not actually quitting while the new one started up. I saw two 'PDFpen' instances in Activity Monitor. At any rate, the new one works great for me, now!
I refuse use the Mac App Store, or to do business with any vendor who only uses the MAS.