pdf won't save on mac

[Careerminded]

I am having trouble with a pdf document and wondered if anyone could help?

I have downloaded a document (application form) from the internet to my Mac.
I can type in to the document, but when I go to save the save and save all options are greyed out.
So I click on Save As and a window pops up with the name of file and where it is saved.
I click on save and it asks if I want to replace the existing file.
I click on replace and nothing is saved, it is still a blank document.

Can anyone help please?

I have downloaded the most up to date version of Adobe and it is still not working.

TIA.

If you're using "Save As". why is it asking you about replacing the file? You need to give it a different name if you want to do this, or it will fail to replace the original because it's already open.

Another trick in Mac OS X is to print it- except you don't- you use the "PDF" button at the bottom left of the print dialog to save it as a PDF instead. I know you ought to be able just to save it, but editing PDFs can be fraught with difficulty (they were never intended to be edited originally) as you know, so this trick can help.

In most cases you'd need some application to edit the PDF and if you've downloaded this from somewhere on the net it may be saved with a 'read only' flag, or you are using something which isn't permitted to save the copy (because it was originally created by someone else).

I don't have an up-to-date Mac nor do I have any Adobe PDF applications to edit a document, so not much help from here this minute.

Maybe you could use 'About' (or similar) to identify exactly what software and what version it is you have been using, in case someone has a suggestion for you.

"they were never intended to be edited originally"

Really ? Felt sure I'd seen mention of some free unix software to do just that.

Admittedly, one of the advantages of PDFs is to prevent arbitrary changes being made by A.N.Other, which would be easier with MS Word or WordPerfect documents.

Well, PDFs were originally invented by Adobe (there were a couple of alternatives at the time, long forgotten) principally for people in printing and repro so that they could send each other mock-up documents without the recipient needing to have all the fonts. This way the PDF would render on the screen of the recipient exactly as it would on the printer elsewhere, and could be signed off as looking OK, and then the real one could be printed. There really was no intention for these to be edited, as they were the digital equivalent of galley proofs- very much the end product.

However PDFs have become a convenient way for people to create complex documents and distribute them just for reading, the bonus being that it doesn't matter what software you start with (anything from Notepad to InDesign) - the output format is the same, and anyone can read it. IMHO there is far too much use of PDFs in situations where simpler document formats would be better (and result in smaller file sizes), but then I'm an old wombat.

There is indeed plenty of software for editing PDFs, but in most of these situations it would be better if the document was something else to start with.

It's an application form for a grant, so is meant to be downloaded in order to be filled in then e mailed back to the grant giver.

prism if I choose a different name it still reverts back to original (i.e. blank) document.

I will call the grant organisation on Monday and see if they can help.

Thanks for trying.

It's really annoying that people put up application forms in PDF expecting you to edit them when they could just use something else like Word or RTF format.

One more thing you can do is to download the demo of PDF2Office, which converts PDFs to Word or Excel format. You can then edit it with no problem. The demo version works for a month or something like that but as you only need it to do one thing, it will solve your problem. If you get the job, tell them to make the application process a bit easier!

Hmmm, it's not part of the 'application' capability test is it

Well I have called them and their helpful answer was to do it on paper if I can't get it to work.
Why put it on a bloody pdf?