How to "Bookmark" a PDF Read-Only Document

Have you ever had to close a lengthy PDF document you've been reading and then struggle try to find your place again after reopening it?

Maybe you would like to create a link to a specific page that has a table or other reference material you may want to view repeatedly.

Well here's a method for opening a PDF read-only document to a specific page from a command line. It can also be used in a shortcut, but we'll start with the command line.

Start/Run

The following command line - as run successfully using Start/Run - uses Adobe Reader to open a specific PDF document to page 24.

AcroRd32.exe /A "page=61=OpenActions" "C:\Documents and Settings\Ed\Desktop\motherboard_manual_ga-ma78gm-us2h_e.pdf"

You can copy and paste this command to open your document, but you will need to change the page number and the name and path of the document you want to open. The open and closed quotes for both parameters are required.

Each time you want to reopen the document press Start/Run - or the Windows Key + R - and change the number after "page=" to open the document to a specific page.

This can unfortunately be difficult to manage. For instance, after you have run this command several times, and possibly changed the number each time to reflect the current page, you will have created a long list of commands to reflect the different page numbers. The list will become longer if you also use this method to open other documents.

What's worse is if you run a program to clear out extraneous debris - as I do occasionally - and the registry key that tracks the Run command gets cleared out. In that case there's a solution; create a shortcut.

Shortcut

The target for the shortcut must be - as in the Run command - the Adobe Reader program itself, not the document.

First, right-click where you want to place the shortcut. Next, browse to the Adobe Reader program or type in its path and name. Mine is located here: C:\Program Files\Adobe\Reader 9.0\Reader, and the program name is AcroRd32.exe. It may be different on your system, but if you already have a shortcut to Adobe Reader, you only need to copy and paste it to the location of your choice and modify it to suit your needs. In my case I had to recreate it because it was not on the desktop or start menu.

Here is how the Target command line looks in my shortcut after it was modified to open the document of my choice to a specific page:

"C:\Program Files\Adobe\Reader 9.0\Reader\AcroRd32.exe" /A "page=61=OpenActions" "C:\Documents and Settings\Ed\Desktop\motherboard_manual_ga-ma78gm-us2h_e.pdf"

As you can see it's nearly identical to the Start/Run command. The only exception is the fully qualified name of Adobe Reader in quotes.

After the shortcut is created you will recognize it's icon. It's the bright red Adobe icon that ends up on your desktop each time you upgrade Adobe Reader, not the white document icon with the letters "PDF" at the top. You can change the icon back to the familiar PDF icon by way of the shortcut property sheet. There are several icons in AcroRd32.dll. Here's the path on my computer: %ProgramFiles%\Adobe\Reader 9.0\Reader.

If you are reading through the document and want the shortcut to reflect the current page, you should remember to modify the shortcut Target "page=" parameter before closing the PDF document. Otherwise you'll be taken back to the same page you were before.