How to convert password protected pdf to word document

Recently, I wanted to edit a pdf that was password protected. For this I wanted to convert the pdf to word.
I tried to use the online pdf to word converters, most of them does not support conversion of password protected pdfs. Only one of them supports conversion of secured pdfs, that is freepdfconvert.
However when I used this feature it denied conversion because the pdf was password protected, strange! 
Disheartened by this I thought there is no way to change this protected pdf.


A day later, I suddenly found the solution for this! and how! 
When I was converting one of my doc files to pdf using my good old tool PrimoPDF, I realized, I can use the same to convert a password protected pdf to non password protected pdf and then use one of the many online tools to convert the unprotected pdf to doc. That's It!

PrimoPDF is a very useful free tool, once installed it adds an options in your printers list just like Mocrosoft OneNote. Using this, one can print (convert) any document to pdf.


So, how to edit a secure pdf?
1. Install PrimoPDF
2. Open the pdf using pdf reader of you choice. My choice is pdf-xchange-viewer.
3. Enter the password. If you don't know the password use some brute-force software to get it, most of these are not free and may not work for complex passwords. Also beware of viruses if you are downloading one.
4. Go to print menu and choose PrimoPDF and tap on print button.
5. Enter the desired address to save the pdf
6. Use one of the online services to convert and download the pdf to doc. I prefer pdfonline as it does not ask for your email address
7. Alter the downloaded  document as per your need
8. User PrimoPDF again to convert the doc in pdf.


Hope this helps :)

Office Tabs not working!

If you are still in stone age and using Microsoft Office without Office Tabs then, office tabs is an office add-on developed by some smart Chinese programmers. Well that made me believe that 'smart' can actually go with 'Chinese' stuff ;-).

This is something that would make Microsoft guys look stupid! How can they keep the users away for something like this for so many years! (something that can even be invented in China !)

This add-on gives tabs to word, excel and power point, much in the same way modern day browsers that opens multiple tabs in one window. (well, I wonder what took it so long for IE to become modern before they could come up with IE7!).

With this you get a clean task-bar as only one instance of word / excel is displayed in task-bar. Tabs can be created by double clicking on tab bar, double click and u close the tab.

You can even choose suitable skin for tabs and customize as per your liking.

You can download the add-on from here. And here is the link to original Chinese site. Both Ofice 2003 and Office 2007 are supported.

Well, while I was going gaga over this Chinese arrangement, it suddenly stopped working! Chinese after all :)
When it stopped working it made my life even harder than what was it before I used this silly add-on. The tabs were gone and there was only one instance of word / excel in task-bar, it became a lot more difficult to use multiple documents as to see other opened docs, I had to minimize the current one.

The worst part was uninstalling the add-on didn't solve the problem, and re-installing did not help. Googling went waste too!!!

After suffering the Chinese curse for around 20 days, I finally decided to take the bull by the horns. Following is how you can get it working again if you :

1. Close all the word, excel and power-point instances

2. Open a new instance of word

3. Go to word options

4. In Word Option select Add-Ins, in the 'Manage' dropdown box, choose COM Add-ins and tap on Go button. Following screen should pop up:

5. Remove the entry for WordTab and reinstall the office tabs. Thus should ideally work

6. However, In my case it did not work, if same happens with you, delete the WordTab entry again, and click on Add button

7. Browse to the path  where office tabs is installed and select the WordTab.dll, this dll should be typically found at: C:\Program Files\OfficeCM\OfficeTab


8. Close the pop-up window for COM Add-Ins, repeat similar steps for your Excel as well, do not forget to select ExcelTab.dll this time ;)

Thats it! the Tabs are back, Hindi Chini Bhai-Bhai again :)

Happy Tabbing!!!