Acrobat X installation installed Safari plugin without asking

Found it!

On the Mac:

1. Go to Library > Internet Plug-Ins
2. You will see AdobePDFViewer.plugin in the list of plugins
3. Create a new folder called Disabled Plug-Ins
4. Move the AdobePDFViewer plugin into the Disabled Plug-Ins folder
5. Restart Safari

Well, I was wrong. Kind of.

PDFs will now open in Acrobat X, but the preference in:

Acrobat > Preferences > Internet > Display PDF in browseris disabled and I can't enable it in Acrobat on the Mac.

The Acrobat X I installed on Windows 7 worked great, no issues with changing the preference to not display the PDF in the browser.

What am I missing?

Hi redcrew,

Display pdf in browser option works differently for Windows and Mac. For Windows you can re-enable is from preferences, however on Mac this option has been removed for security purposes. There are two ways to get 'Display PDF in browser' plug-in back and working:
1. Put the plug-in back into its original location (Library > Internet Plug-Ins)
2. Reinstall AcrobatX (if you have permanently deleted the plug-in from your system)

regards,
hitanand

Thanks for the quick response.

I'm curious, what is the security issue on Mac that isn't on Windows? (I'm used to the other way around for those two operating systems.)

I have no interest in having the PDF open in the browser, I would rather a PDF open in its native application. It's more of nagging issue than anything else.

The PDFs are opening correctly on the Mac, but looking at the grayed out box with the "Display PDF in browser" enabled even though it's not enabled (due to my removing the plugin from the Library > Internet Plug-Ins folder) is confusing and misleading to the end user.

Can you point me to where the Mac security issue with "Display PDF in Browser" for Acrobat X is documented on the Adobe site? I searched, but couldn't find it.

I found the Adobe Acrobat and Reader security page at:

http://www.adobe.com/security/acrobat_reader/

but there is no mention of the "Display PDF in Browser" issue.

AcrobatX/ReaderX uses MANAGED installation method on Mac(as compared to MANUAL installation method used in earlier versions). In case of manual installation method installation and repair was dependent on "Self heal" mechanism that required the admin privileges each time it was invoked. This raised a bit of concern so to remove this Adobe now uses Managed installation method and discontinued Self Heal mechanism.
Thus there is no security issue with "Display PDF in Browser". It is disabled because of the different installation approach used by Adobe.
Hope it answers your query.

regards
hitanand

Thanks hitanand.

Can you point to the article on the Adobe site describing the new installation process?

From your previous reply, "Mac this option has been removed for security purposes. " I had understood the grayed out box was a security issue.

There were two major reasons why Adobe switched over to managed installation on Mac
1.To extend support to Enterprise deployment.
2.Remove the permission elevation state due to self heal mechanism.

For more details see link below:
http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/837/cpsid_83709/attachments/Acrobat_Enterprise_Administration.pdf

regards,
hitanand

Thanks for the response. I'm a bit confused. My installation was not an enterprise installation, it was a standalone installation of Acrobat X.

The link you sent to me was for deploying enterprise Acrobat.

Am I missing something? Your answers don't seem to address my question and add more confusion. First, you said the grayed out box was due to security issues. Your most recent reply is pointing to a changed installation process for enterprise deployment for Acrobat X.

I'm looking for an explanation on why the "Display PDF in Browser" check box is enabled, but grayed out when in fact it's not enabled after I move the plugin out of the Library > Internet Plug-Ins folder.I tweeted about the issue, and thankfully Dave Stromfield (@acro_dave) on the Acrobat team replied back. I'll follow up with him, and post what I discover.

Thanks for quick response. For more details on Display PDF in Browser you can follow the link:
http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/870/cpsid_87060.php

Yes, I found that page a couple days ago, after @acro_Dave (Dave Stromfield) pointed me to it. Hopefully it will help others who are looking for the Adobe reference material about the plugin.

It would be helpful if the page was updated with a note that the "Display PDF in Browser" box will remain grayed out and enabled on the Mac even after taking the step to remove the plugin from the Library > Internet Plug-Ins folder.It's very misleading to the end user to see the box enabled, even though the user has taken action to disable PDF viewing in the browser.

There are a couple of other possibly related known issues that you might want to be aware of when installing Acrobat X on the Mac:[br]
If Acrobat X or Reader X is installed on a system with Acrobat 9 or Acrobat 8 already installed, then Acrobat X or Reader X takes ownership of the Safari plug-in. If a user uninstalls Acrobat 9 or Acrobat 8, then the plug-in for viewing a PDF in Safari is also uninstalled. The result is that a PDF opens with Apple Preview and not Acrobat or Reader, even if Acrobat X or Reader X is present in the system. The workaround is to reinstall or repair the Acrobat X installation, which restores the Safari plug-in. [2684577]


Uninstalling
If a user installs the Safari plug-in during Reader installation, the user cannot remove the plug-in later. For example, the user cannot specify that the default Mac OS X Preview opens PDFs in the browser, [2685190]

So having installed Acrobat X, there is ABSOLUTELY no way to stop the reader opening PDFs in the browser even after uninstalling the product? (!)