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<div class="center_top">Thoughtful, detailed coverage of the Mac, iPhone, and iPad, plus the best-selling <a href="http://www.takecontrolbooks.com/?pt=TB-TAGLINE" style="color:yellow">Take Control</a> ebooks.</div>
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<h5>Author Biography</h5>
<p class="tearoffbox_text">Derek K. Miller is Communications Manager for Navarik, an Internet software company in Vancouver, Canada. By night, he wears a wig and plays drums in a classic rock cover band, and is also the co-host of the Inside Home Recording podcast. His blog, like his youngest daughter, is six years old in 2006. <<A HREF="http://www.navarik.com/">http://www.navarik.com/</A>><BR> <<A HREF="http://www.insidehomerecording.com/">http://www.insidehomerecording.com/</A>><BR> <<A HREF="http://www.penmachine.com/">http://www.penmachine.com/</A>> (June 2006)</p><p class="tearoffbox_text_email"><span class="shift_down"><img src="/images/gettb_button_email.gif" height="12" width="12" border="0" alt="Send Email to Author"></span> <a href="javascript:void(0)" onClick="document.check_human_287.submit_type.value='email'; document.check_human_287.author_id.value='287'; ShowTipBox('hc_287', 'hc_recaptcha_287', 'cb_item_add')">Email the author</a></p>
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<h6>Find Text Leading from Acrobat PDF</h6>
<p><p>Ever have to recreate a document from an Acrobat PDF? You can find out most everything about the text by using the Object Inspector, except the leading. Well, here's a cheesy way to figure it out. Open the PDF in Illustrator (you just need one page). Release any and all clipping masks. Draw a guide at the baseline of the first line of text, and one on the line below. Now, Option-drag the first line to make a copy, and position it exactly next to the original first line at baseline. Then put a return anywhere in the copied line. Now adjust leading of the copied lines, so that the second line of copy rests on the baseline of the second line of the original. Now you know your leading.</p><p>Or you could buy expensive software to find the leading. Your choice.</p></p>
<p>Visit <a href="http://macproductionartist.wordpress.com">Mac Production Artist Tips and Scripts</a></p>
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<div style="padding-bottom:35px"><div class="tip_display" style="float:left"><p><br><a href="/tipbits/172">Link to this tip</a></p></div><div class="tip_display" style="float:right; width:150px">
<a href="/article/8578"onMouseOver="blurb_slide('8578', 'show')">Unintelligible Garbage Is Your Friend</a></h4>
<div class="article_preview" id="blurb_8578" style="display:none"><div id="popup_inner_8578">I'm getting tired of reading frequent news stories about laptop computers lost, stolen, or left in the back seats of cabs by company or government employees, supposedly exposing untold thousands of social security numbers, insurance records, or other sensitive, private information to identity thieves and other miscreants</div><!-- blurb inner --></div><!-- blurb outer -->
<div class="featured_meta"><a href="/index.cgi?tbcat=" class="category"></a> | by <a href="/author/Derek%20K.%20Miller">Derek K. Miller</a> | 26 Jun 2006</div></div>
<div class="article_preview" id="blurb_7294" style="display:none"><div id="popup_inner_7294">Most spam is simply annoying - a waste of time, effort, and computer resources, to be sure, but not usually dangerous. However, a small but significant number of spammers go beyond being merely misleading or offensive by actively trying to defraud people</div><!-- blurb inner --></div><!-- blurb outer -->
<div class="featured_meta"><a href="/index.cgi?tbcat=" class="category"></a> | by <a href="/author/Derek%20K.%20Miller">Derek K. Miller</a> | 04 Aug 2003</div></div>
<a href="/article/6981"onMouseOver="blurb_slide('6981', 'show')">Doing Three People's Work with One Mac</a></h4>
<div class="article_preview" id="blurb_6981" style="display:none"><div id="popup_inner_6981">As I packed for a trip last June, my wife looked into my suitcase. She noted that while she usually brings extra clothes and accessories when traveling, "you seem to pack wires." Sure enough, my shirts, pants, and toiletries were shoved into a corner, overwhelmed by an Ethernet hub and cables, a USB trackball, a keyboard, headphones, and assorted unidentifiable Mac flotsam</div><!-- blurb inner --></div><!-- blurb outer -->
<div class="featured_meta"><a href="/index.cgi?tbcat=" class="category"></a> | by <a href="/author/Derek%20K.%20Miller">Derek K. Miller</a> | 04 Nov 2002</div></div>
<a href="/article/6756"onMouseOver="blurb_slide('6756', 'show')">Late for the Train: Editing Digital Video on the Cheap</a></h4>
<div class="article_preview" id="blurb_6756" style="display:none"><div id="popup_inner_6756">For a long time, digital video editing seemed more work than it was worth, and I let Apple's DV train pass right on by. Recently, I was forced to catch up all too quickly, but I managed to do it without emptying my bank account on new hardware and software.The Train Has Left the Station -- One of my jobs is being a drummer for a retro-'60s faux British Invasion band here in Vancouver called The Neurotics.In spring 2001, our booking agent arranged to have one of our larger performances professionally videotaped by a camera crew</div><!-- blurb inner --></div><!-- blurb outer -->
<div class="featured_meta"><a href="/index.cgi?tbcat=" class="category"></a> | by <a href="/author/Derek%20K.%20Miller">Derek K. Miller</a> | 18 Mar 2002</div></div>
<a href="/article/6621"onMouseOver="blurb_slide('6621', 'show')">How You Slice It: Two Mac-Friendly Palm Word Processors</a></h4>
<div class="article_preview" id="blurb_6621" style="display:none"><div id="popup_inner_6621">Word processing on a Palm OS-based handheld device seems a silly idea. A tiny, 160 by 160 pixel screen, limited font support, and no hard drive or keyboard? Processor speed and RAM put to shame by a Mac from 1993?Yet here I am, composing this article on a Palm IIIxe - and not just to prove a point</div><!-- blurb inner --></div><!-- blurb outer -->
<div class="featured_meta"><a href="/index.cgi?tbcat=" class="category"></a> | by <a href="/author/Derek%20K.%20Miller">Derek K. Miller</a> | 05 Nov 2001</div></div>