Going a little nuts here, and it'll get worse as we approach midnight tomorrow, Sunday the 31st. I'm trying to submit my paperback book file to IngramSpark by then, because that's when the NaNoWriMo free title setup offer expires. I really wasn't planning on being last minute about this, but I've found out that the requirements aren't as simple as they first appear. For instance, IS tells me the interior file has to be in PDF. Oh, that's fine, think I. My WordPerfect X6 program has a handy-dandy PDF converter. But I get deeper into the IS instructions, and they tell me it can't be any old PDF format, it has to be either PDF/X-1a:2001 or PDF/X-3:2002. Something having to do with readability by whatever physical printers they go with and/or making sure all the fonts are embedded. My WPX6 converter doesn't have either PDF/X as an option (neither does MS Word, I read). WP does have a "Commercial Printer" setting, and I experimented with that. Got excited when I saw my fonts were embedded, even the ones I designed myself on Calligraphr . . . till I scrolled down and saw that my body text font was not. Aaaaaggghhhh!!!! It's a really cool font called Rosarivo, I've designed my formatting around it, and yes, it's licensed for commercial use. So I'm thinking maybe, just maybe, it will embed with PDF/X-1a:2001 or PDF/X-3:2002, but I can't find how or where to get my file into either of those formats! A converter is key, right? I've found a few on Google, but are they safe? If you've submitted a file to IngramSpark, how did you get it into the PDF/X format? Is there a convert-to-PDF app you've used and recommend? I'll be checking in to hear. Probably will be up all night anyway.
Adobe Acrobat Pro DC can export to PDF/X-1a and PDF/X-3 under File -> Save as Other -> Press Ready PDF. Though that's a paid product, not sure if it's available on a trial or not. Depends what you mean by safe for converters on google. Yes, they'd be able to keep a copy of the file if they wanted to. They could possibly put something dangerous in if they really wanted to. Though you could research an individual converter to see if it's worth trusting. It'd probably be fine, but would be a risk for sure.
I saw a trial period on Pro today when I downloaded plain Adobe Acrobat Reader DC to check my embedding. And I've just found a thread on another forum I belong to, where a member says she used the Pro version to finally-and-at-last convert her file to PDF/X. So off I go back to the Adobe page to do a download. I feel a little sneaky stopping it after the trial period, but I doubt that after this I'll need the pro features for awhile. Wish me luck. I really, really like that body font, and I want to keep it. EDIT: Could just be my laptop, but it's taking forever to install. Sigh. I'm playing on my PC while I wait.
PDF/X is a subset designed for printers to get graphics correct, it can be accessed in Acrobat Pro, I have never seen it anywhere else though. I'm not sure if the online converters are a real thing or not. if you get totally stuck I could process it through Acrobat for you in a few minutes I expect. If your deadline gets too close and you want to do that I'll be on my PC most of tomorrow afternoon and evening.
Yeah, another thing with online converters is that they tend to be a bit sloppy on the details like font. Adobe's products are your best bet to get the conversion right.
I found this one and ran a sample document through it, and it hasn't triggered any malware or virus warnings and I can't find anything nefarious hiding in the file. But it does have to be an image file, so may not be the best for your purposes.
Did the link drop out? Because apparently I have to submit the cover file as a PDF, too. Though GIMP may be able to take care of that.
OK, it took a lot of faffing around, but I finally came up with a PDF/X with all the fonts embedded. Had to try to save it in the Preflight about four times before it would take, however. (And to think that when I got up this morning, I'd never heard of preflight in connection with book production!)
I suspect the major issue here will be even if you get a working file the print formatting of the book will be nasty and not look professional I use vellum and/or indesign, but for those that don't want the expense Affinity publisher (DTP) is currently free in beta Also don't rush things because the nano code is expiring - there are always free codes around for ingram PUBLISH2019 will work through to December, and GETPUBLISHED is evergreen
