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When someone sends me PDF files I can open them but I am not able to edit them why? I have adobe reader but not adobe writer is this my problem?
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That's the entire point of the PDF. So the author can maintain control of the article or document.
Nothing's broke here. If you need to edit the document, ask the author for the source.
Bob
The PDF file is essentially an "electronic printout" rather than an editable document. They come in either a rasterised format whcih is typical for "scan-to-PDF" output or as a metafile or vector format if an office program or graphics program can save or export to PDF. This latter situation is exploited by programs that convert from PDF to Word or edit PDF files. For that matter, these PDFs are used as masters for when you send documents to a print shop to be printed or publish to a Website as "download-to-print" material.
Some "scan-to-PDF" programs may implement an optical-character-recognition engine to create searchable text of that document in order to allow you to search for scanned documents on your computer or network.
Think of PDF = "protected document file" from the author and intended as shown not to be edited.
Also, don't confuse other PDF files such as forms or questionnaires that can be filled-in in the "blanks" which is the purpose.
tada -----Willy 
The sender sent the PDF File to me with the purpose of proof reading and then editing the file before sending it on. What do we need then to edit or change the files on our computer?
For example I have my original in Word and save it as PDF when sending it over for proof reading. You can try Adobe's markup tools and see if that's what they want.
For when the markup tools fail I just make a change list. EXAMPLE:
1. Page 32, paragraph 2 should give credit to Caesar and not Torquemada.
2. Page 192, the entire passage is a re-write of the prior chapter. Delete?
And so on.
Bob
If your do a lot of PDF work, then I suggest you buy software that will allow you to do this. I currently use Nuance PDF Converter Professional 7. There is a newer version out (
but it will double your costs. #7 will cost about $50.
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