Tuesday 24 May 2011

Adobe Reader 10 cannot open pdf from UNC path

If you have deployed Adobe Reader 10 and get messages saying that your users cannot open .pdf files from a network location the likely culprit is that protected mode is enabled.
You can turn this mode off using a registry edit as below:

Registry Editing Method
Open notepad and paste the following command, when pasted save as a .reg file.

REG ADD "HKCU\SOFTWARE\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\10.0\Privileged" /v bProtectedMode /t REG_DWORD /d 0 /f
 
Alternative Method
If using Server 2008R2 you can set a preference to make a change to the registry for users as below
Open Group Policy Management from Start > Administrative Tools > Group Policy Management


Create a new Group Policy Object


Give the GPO a suitable name
 

Right click and select edit

 
Expand the User Preferences menu option

 
Expand the Windows Settings and select Registry

 
In the blank area in the right hand pane right click and select New > Registry Item

 
Ensure that the settings are to ‘Update’ the registry key, also check that the selected hive is HKEY_CURRENT_USER.
In the Key path enter ‘SOFTWARE\Adobe\Acrobat Reader\10.0\Privileged’

 
Enter ‘bProtectedMode’ into the Value box

 
Change the value type to REG_DWORD


In the value box enter ‘0’

 
Click OK and you are done.
 

This is how the finished registry entry should look.

2 comments:

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  2. As you said that Adobe Reader 10 cannot open pdf from UNC path.If we have deployed Adobe Reader 10 and get messages saying that your users cannot open .pdf files from a network location the likely culprit is that protected mode is enabled and we can turn this mode off using a registry edit .Its really useful information.

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