gPDF is a handy tool to view online PDF, DOC, DOCX, XLS, XLSX, PPT, PPTX, RTF, Open Document format (ODT, ODS, ODP), CSV, SXW, SXC and SXI files. It sets links to these file formats to open with Google Docs Viewer and Zoho Viewer. Hence, you don’t need any desktop based PDF viewer (like Adobe Reader) or Office suite (like MS Office) to open such files.
Open online RTF files with Zoho Viewer
Open online PDF files with Google Docs Viewer
Benefits of using gPDF
- gPDF automatically sets links to RTF, ODT, ODS, ODP, CSV, SXW, SXC and SXI files to open with Zoho Viewer; and links to PDF, DOC, DOCX, XLS, XLSX, PPT and PPTX files to open with Google Docs Viewer. No manual effort required.
- You are Safe. You don’t need to use potentially vulnerable tools such as a local PDF reader to open above file formats. You open files remotely, without downloading them.
- Fast! No more wait for downloading such files first. It feels like visiting another web page!
- HTTPS Secured connection. gPDF connects to Google Docs Viewer using secured connection.
- You don’t need Adobe Reader, MS Office, OpenOffice.org or any other software to open online files.
- Full screen view.
- Download opened files to your computer, when required.
- Options to edit and save opened files in your Google Docs account / Zoho account. Note: Google Docs does not support editing for PDF files.
Options to download, edit and save opened file in Google Docs Viewer
Options to download, edit and export opened file in Zoho Viewer
Install gPDF
Greasemonkey script (userscript).
About
gPDF is maintained by Arpit Kumar, and released under GPL without any guarantee.
Thanks to hundreds of the users for their feedback and support. Thanks to Prateek, Stephen Walker, David and Steve for their tips.
Read reviews of gPDF.
Changelog
- 5 May, 2012 – v4.0.2: Removed ‘embedded=true’ URL parameter to ensure proper rendering at Google Docs Viewer.
- 19 Jan, 2011 – v4.0: added support for .rtf, Open Document formats (.odt, .odp, .ods) etc. Optimized code.
- 9 Jan, 2011 – v3.5 added support for .xls and .xlsx formats.
- 7 Aug, 2010 – v3.1 released with support for new layout of Google Docs Viewer. Thanks Steve.
- 22 June, 2010 – v3 released with HTTPS, full screen view etc. Thanks Mr. Stephen Walker.
- 10 June, 2010 – Added support for .doc, .docx and .ppt files.
- 9 June, 2010 – Fixed the bug: cases where document.links is undefined. Thanks David!
- 26 January 2010 – v 2.1 For Chrome / v 1.2 for Firefox, Greasemonkey : Fixed minor bugs.
- 9 December 2009 – v1.3: Fixed problems while downloading. Thanks Eugene.
- 23 October 2009 – v 1.1 : Fixed problems (double prefix) with links already pointing to Google Docs Viewer. Thanks Łukasz Polowczyk.
Good work for google chrome.
you can run greasemonkey scripts in safari as well, and this userscript will work there too.
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Cool tool: Use Google Docs to read pdfs in your browser without downloading the pdf.
Want to view PDF files faster? Try this handy little plugin.
very useful. great job. I hope developers like you will rock Google Chrome. Thanks.
Great tool for me. liked chrome extension. <3
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Great plugin.
Worked perfect in Chromium under Ubuntu Jaunty (9.04).
Thank you very much!
I hate opening a PDF in a browser. The solution is gPDF which lets you open many documents Google Docs Viewer. [link to post] — said on twitter
very useful addon and simple to use,
but the function is limited, hope it can support for ppt,doc and xls
and i dont know why when i login “Discuz! 7.2″ will have error “Error: dl is undefined”
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Excellent idea. However, it needs to be modified to not do the redirection to Google Docs on “file://” links since a) these cannot be loaded by google docs and b) even if it could, doing so would constitute information leakage.
hi,
i use firefox with gPDF addon.
its excellent addon.
but its not enabled in update scanner 3.1.2 page.
i hope gPDF addon enabled in chrome:.
chrome://updatescan/content/diffPage.xul?id=…
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Thanks for the great plugin.
It would be nice to have the ability to configure an exception list of sites that you want to be able to download the PDF from. Or perhaps a command on the right click context menu that will allow you to override gPDF on a case-by-case basis so you can download the file. Sometimes you have PDFs on an intranet that you can’t open with Google Docs, or sensitive PDFs that you don’t trust Google Docs to open, or PDFs that you just want to download and save for some reason.
great addon, i love it! especially, since google viewer has been improved (search function, display of graphics, etc.) this tool is really useful
one suggestion: the addon has a problem with pages that have a .pdf ending but do not directly point to a PDF-file, because there is a redirect (e. g. try out http://www.springerlink.com/index/Y546020M6Q477237.pdf)For these sites it would be great to have an option in the context menu to bypass google viewer!
this would also be useful for situations where google viewer happens to have troubles displaying the pdf-file (unfortunately, sometimes this is the case).
thanks, and keep up the good work! :)
another possibility would be an ignore list (to enter domains where gPDF should be inactive)
Having Firefox, which do you recommend? The Greasemonkey script or the extension? I’m asking because add-ons are known to make the RAM load go up; any takes on this?
I would recommend the add-on! The RAM load is negligible, at least for gPDF. There is no trusted way to update greasemonkey scripts. :( By installing add-on, you will get future releases easily. I’m about to add more features. :)
There’s a message at the top of my browser that says
The newest version of the extension “gPDF” requires more permissions, so it has been disabled.
What does this mean?
@David B: I’ve updated gPDF, and added support for .doc, .docx and .ppt files. Hence, Chrome is asking you to grant permission to gPDF.
This action is totally safe – and does not harm users. :)
I echo what barry (#27) said. An exception list is required for those who have access to an intranet.
I’m excited to use gpdf though since I access pdf’s from an intranet, I can’t use it at work. :(
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Could you please add a whitelist to the addin? The addins makes it impossible to use the SkyDrive from MS.
Any news about the new version with a whitelist?
the easiest way to add white-listed sites (where you don’t want gPDF): use the greasemonkey version of gPDF and use @exclude for such domain names.
install it from here: http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/62538
Also, greasemonkey works with Chrome. See details here:
http://blog.arpitnext.com/2009/09/use-run-greasemonkey-scripts-in-google-chrome.html
Gah! Write this for Safari now! Easily ported from the Google Chrome plugin!
Hi. Thanks for this great extension for Chrome (much needed)!
Two requests:
1. Please keep it small and simple (I’ve just ditched Google’s official extension because it now uses its own process in Task Manager = more memory);
2. Pleas add a contextual menu (secondary click on links) to explicitly allow opening the file on GoogleDocs or download the file.
Kudos!
Oh, I forgot in request #2: open in new tab. Thanks again!
In Opera with GreaseMonkey script there is no download link to save file to your local drive…
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@zigomir: Install the updated script. It should have the download link now.
Nice addon, thank you.
Will it be upgraded for Firefox 4 soon? I guess I’ll test the current version with F4 and see how it goes.
I do have one issue, sometimes gPDF kicks in when it’snot a .pdf file. For example, say I’m trying to download a .torrent file that was named example.pdf.document.torrent. gPDF I guess parses the “.pdf” even if it isn’t the extension and tries to open it in Google. I’ve had that occur with files named something like “example.pdf.zip”. Any chance of fixing that?
Thanks
@mvario : yes! gPDF will be ready for Firefox 4 soon.
@mvario: http://pastebin.com/raw.php?i=SbM3m0Nb should fix that along with ignoring file: links and adding a primitive blacklist.
Actually, http://pastebin.com/raw.php?i=pMcbvugL should work better than the previous post.
I’m founding a problem with “Document Foundation” site at http://www.documentfoundation.org
All the links (Foundation, LibreOffice, etc…) are opened inside google docs, but they aren’t documents!
This is a great tool. But… the version stamp in the .xpi needlessly limits it to Firefox 3.x. Could some kind soul please fix the .xpi so that it runs under 4.x too?
I am NOT tech saavy. I added this add-on and re-started Firefox, but the add-on is nowhere to be found. Firefox has it listed as being added, but the option button does not work… any suggestions? I uninstalled and re-installed… same problem.
@April: there is no UI for this addon.
TO TEST- After installing, try to open a webpage with a link to supported file formats (or search this on google – “india filetype:pdf”). You will notice that it opens with google docs.
Surfing the net I found the way to open also local file (google toolbar with firefox),
there is a way to do the same thing with chrome?
(We have a local network webserver, with a repository of searchable files: should be cool and useful view the .doc/.ppt/.xls files without download them)
regards,
k.
Hi Arpit. thanks for updating gpdf to work fine with FireFox 4. I noticed that it is running smoothly.
I am unable to find version 4 in mozilla addon gallery. it is still showing up version 3.5. how to update to latest version?
thnks
@Steve P: I have uploaded the v4 to AMO, and it is pending for the review. Should be available within few days.
Arpit, thank you for the Opera version. I installed version 4.0.1 and opened a gmail message that included a PDF link. But gPDF couldn’t redirect the PDF link to goggle docs :(
As a work-around I found that if select Print in the gmail message pull-down menu, then gPDF does successfully redirect the PDF link in the PRINT VERSION of the message.
Also, google docs now supports 12 new formats, can gPDF do the same?
http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2011/02/12-new-file-formats-in-google-docs.html
Thanks again Arpit.
@operated: Thanks for your comment.
gPDF already supports few of those 12 new formats: XLS, XLSX, PPTX. I will add support for few more extensions soon. Will explore the issue w/ Opera mail.
How can I display the page thumbnails?
Sometimes it is good to have them: On slow connections I do not have to download all the pages when looking for information.
Doesn’t work at redirect URL.
for example http://ow.ly/4KQHz
One of the most useful extension for anyone. I can’t imagine viewing PDF files without it.
Thanks for creating.
I’ve loaded it (Firefox 5), nothing happens; what am I supposed to do to use it?
this extension has no browser layout, option panel or user interface. It simply scans webpages and replaces all links to supported files to open with Google Docs. To try this, you can visit the following page:
http://www.labnol.org/gadgets/airtel-net-pc/9098/
You will notice a link with anchor text “this PDF” on this page. This link points to a PDF file. If you have not installed gPDF – that PDF file will open in Adobe Reader or other installed desktop based PDF viewer. But with gPDF , it will be opened using Google Docs. I have already pointed out several benefits of using Google Docs
Unfortunately, I had to disable the extension in Firefox … I was routinely getting ‘unable to open’ messages in Google Docs when clicking on Word .docx files. I have not set the default in Firefox to just use Word for these files when I click on them. Please post if there is something wrong, or if this gets fixed.
Nice tool. Great job with Opera extension. Thanks!
Your extension for opera not working on the site vk.com/docs (Russian social network). When I try to upload my documents to the site, I did not show the dialog “Select File”. In Opera dragonfly shows the error “Unhandled Error: Cannot convert ‘this.parentNode.nextSibling’ to object”. Sorry for the English, translated in Google Translate. Opera 12.15 x64, Windows 7 Professional x64, gPDF v.4.0.2