Digital/pdf version of NEC
- Thread starter c_picard
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kwired
Electron manager
- Location
- NE Nebraska
I don't care if you personally hand delivered it, I'd bet a large sum that the information will not get much consideration from them though.
First they do offer an E-book version that likely does have better navigation tools then a PDF reader has.
We went through this same thing with 2011, they did offer NEC plus, which was better then using a PDF reader. But they discontinued NEC plus late Feb or early March even though there are many AHJ's out there that have the 2011 as their standard. That is my biggest complaint is the retiring of the NEC plus too soon, I realize they needed to make some changes to help with piracy and illegal distribution and had accepted the new alternative, then they took it away too soon.
kwired
Electron manager
- Location
- NE Nebraska
Then they take the less user friendly PDF file and make it even more user unfriendly by protecting it which keeps users from adding bookmarks or notes
I can navigate faster through a hard copy then most of what I need to find in a PDF.
I can navigate faster through a hard copy then most of what I need to find in a PDF.
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I heard about a guy who downloaded all nec pdfs from torrent sharing website and he can bookmark it, highlight, edit, search and even view on iPhone without internet service. Or I heard about a guy who typed in 'nec 2011' in google search and the first link from top was a downloadable pdf.
- Location
- Chapel Hill, NC
- Occupation
- Retired Electrical Contractor
I agree with kwire that the old cd rom had an extra layer in the chapter areas where you could go to the exact article and section number. With this setup you can only get to the beginning of each article. Thus if I wanted 250.122 I could only get to the beginning of art 250 and then scroll to 122.. PITA
Do a search for 250.122.............
- Location
- Chapel Hill, NC
- Occupation
- Retired Electrical Contractor
And it takes you to article 215 where 250.122 is mentioned. Besides you don't always know the exact article but if you see it it may help
Nom Deplume
Senior Member
- Location
- USA
Does the 2014 PDF use the fileopen plugin?
- Location
- Illinois
- Occupation
- retired electrician
The handbook pdf has bookmarks to the section level, not just the article level, however I would find the handbook a much better document if you could look at just the code text without the commentary. The commentary is nice to have sometimes, but it really slows down going to the part of the section that you want to look at. It would also be easier to use if the bookmarks went to at least the first sub-division of the section.
There are also no bookmarks to the tables, and those would also be nice to have.
There are also no bookmarks to the tables, and those would also be nice to have.
- Location
- Placerville, CA, USA
- Occupation
- Retired PV System Designer
It uses the permissions controls built into the Acrobat format instead of "add on" rights management.
Tapatalk!
Click on Art. 250, then start the search. That should initiate the search from that point.
kwired
Electron manager
- Location
- NE Nebraska
That is what I liked about the older electronic versions, typing a search is handy if you don't know what you are looking for, but I often know what I am looking for don't know exactly where it is but do know approximately where it is. The menu tree can get you to where you want to be pretty quickly if you know about where to go, and just being close and reading section titles as you work through the menu often you recognize a section title and you then know exactly which section you want to go to.
250.122 for example PDF bookmarks take you to first page of 250, which in my 2011 PDF is page 103 of the PDF, then you have to scroll through until you get to page 128 to see table 250.122 That one happens to be a little easier to scroll to because it is a table and you don't have to look as hard at content just look for a table as you scroll, but if looking through that many pages for something other then a table, will take a little more time as you have to look harder at the content to get to where you want to be.
Probably pirated copies. NFPA protected their versions that they distribute to make them more difficult to redistribute, but I'm sure if you know what you are doing it can still be worked around. Other possibility is for someone to take the time to load every page of a hard copy and create their own file and distribute it. If I were to take the time to do that and distribute some copies (even though illegal) I don't think it would be worth my time unless I charged more then NFPA sells the official versions for.
Agree. FWIW, a legitimate PDF permits printing. One could print the entire PDF as an unprotected PDF then add their own bookmarks... but that's just it?they'd have to add all the bookmarks.
kwired
Electron manager
- Location
- NE Nebraska
I have a printer driver that is essentially a pdf converter, just send the entire document to such a utility
That's what I was referring to... but bookmarks do not make it through the "print" process.I have a printer driver that is essentially a pdf converter, just send the entire document to such a utility
I have a printer driver that is essentially a pdf converter, just send the entire document to such a utility
What is a pdf converter?
kwired
Electron manager
- Location
- NE Nebraska
What all ten of them?
Ok, there is more then that, but should be many more then there is.:happyyes:
Well the type he's referring to installs as a printer (i.e. print driver). After it's installed you just print from the application and choose the printer to create the PDF file. There are several available free: Foxit, CutePDF, etc. Adobe PDF is installed with the full or pro' version of Acrobat.
Perhaps... but that's sorta the point of being able to add bookmarks. Besides, if there was a bookmark for every section, you'd spend just as much time scrolling bookmarks to get to where you want to go as just scrolling the pages. I have Acrobat set to show a single full page just for this purpose. When set to continuous pages, it takes forever to scroll the document. Using the scroll bar goes too fast. I suppose bookmarks for "Parts" may provide an advantage.
FWIW, I tried several print2PDF's. In some cases, printing wasn't permitted from an encrypted PDF. In others that did actually print, the resulting text in the file could not be copy and pasted, i.e. in a readable manner. I have one that comes really close to original, but a few snafus here and there. Enough for me to stick with the original legitimate doc, and contend with the cons.
Using a scanned-OCR'd version from this site provides better end-user performance....
https://archive.org/details/nfpa.nec.2014
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