Program to measure in a PDF doc?

[MAREBER]

Good morning all,

I am trying to find an easy way for our office manager to take the scaled PDFs that I create and do accurate measurements from them, when I am not available to answer her questions on the measurements.

There must be an easy to use, PDF measuring program (Adobe?)  for quick calculations of Square Feet and Linear Feet from an existing PDF?

 

I'm open to any and all suggestions. Thank you in advance!

[MAREBER]

To be clear, I know that one can do measurements within the adobe acrobat program, but this only gets us so far, in that I can only make it do straight line measurements, and in landscape architecture, we have LOTS of curves. Thanks!

[BIGAL]

If I remember correctly TRUEVIEW is free and may do what the person wants, they can open a dwg, view it, plot it not sure about object properties.

 

https://www.autodesk.com/products/dwg-trueview/overview it shows a measure icon in the web page.

Edited March 24 by BIGAL

[MAREBER]

Thanks so much, I'll check into it!

 

[eldon]

I am not sure how my free version of Adobe Acrobat differs, but in the measurement tool I can measure lengths, perimeters and areas.

 

 

[MAREBER]

yes, that I can do. What we are in need of is a tool that can also measure curvalinear lines.

[MAREBER]

  On 3/24/2025 at 10:10 PM, BIGAL said:

If I remember correctly TRUEVIEW is free and may do what the person wants, they can open a dwg, view it, plot it not sure about object properties.

 

https://www.autodesk.com/products/dwg-trueview/overview it shows a measure icon in the web page.

Expand  

Hmmm, after a quick look, this seems to be more for people editing CAD, not so much for viewing and measuring completed drawings.

[eldon]

  On 3/25/2025 at 2:13 PM, MAREBER said:

yes, that I can do. What we are in need of is a tool that can also measure curvalinear lines.

Expand  

 

Using the perimeter tool is easier with a mouse and good hand/eye coordination, so probably would not suit some users, especially whilst tracing over curves.

[SLW210]

They need to be using a CAD program and .dwg or .dxf if they need accuracy. This is not what a PDF is used for, IMO.

 

Just place the relevant dimensions on the drawing before making it a PDF.

 

Use the tools in Adobe Acrobat and do the best as you can as mentioned by eldon.

 

You could use some math calculations on the known parameters of the curves to get a more accurate measurement.

 

All sounds like a lot of extra work when an inexpensive CAD program could do this quickly.

[MAREBER]

The office manager does not know CAD, nor do they have a subscription. I am an independent consultant/ contractor for this Design/ Build firm. I design and draw up the plans, they install the designs.

 

They do not require, nor do they want to pay me to draw up detailed layout plans.

They only need quick measurements for some things when I am not available to answer specific questions. I do supply scaled drawings, along with a breakdown of measurements for all programming, however, at times, they add items, delete items, etc. It is at these times, they would like to be able to figure it out for themselves.

 

It just feels like there should be a quick and dirty program for this purpose, that is user friendly without having to learn new skills?

 

 

[SLW210]

Precise measuring is not the intended purpose of PDF format.

 

If you are asking for new programs to do this, then by default, those needing it will need to be trained.

 

Apparently they do not even know how to use Acrobat which they already have, I would presume. 

 

They could always plot and use the appropriate ruler scale like in old times. Though I would presume they would need training.

 

You do not have to "know" CAD to open a drawing and get some dimensions any more than you would need to learn to do it for a PDF.

 

There are some very cheap and free CAD programs that would work for measuring .dxf etc.

 

Inkscape/Illustrator has measure tool, not sure if it's easier or better than the Acrobat one though.

[CyberAngel]

At one job they had a software package called Bluebeam. It can measure objects for you. Not free, but if your client is willing to pay for Adobe, they can pay for this.

[SLW210]

There's one called FoxyUtils that could work for $99 USD. No details on how it measures curves.

 

I found this one yearly subscription is $14.99 USD a month it comes with arc length measurement Xodo | Secure All-in-One PDF Solution for Every Platform 

 

PDF Markup and Measurement Software - Bluebeam Revu with measure is $330 USD per year. To measure curves you draw straight lines and go back and add control points to get as close to the shape as possible from what they show on their website.

 

Sounds to me that might as well just try the free Adobe Reader measure tool over Bluebeam Revu unless money isn't an issue.

 

 

 

I forgot to ask, are these vector or raster PDFs?

[MAREBER]

Just want to quickly thank you both, so you know I am paying attention... just don't have the time currently to check into your suggestions, but I will!!!