Why won't Foxit or PDF-X work in place of Adobe in this situation?

I use Foxit on my laptop but had to put Adobe back on my desktop last year due to the fact that my daughter uses that computer for her schoolwork and neither Foxit or PDF-X will work for what she needs them to do. Neither will work properly with a computer based textbook which she used last year (I still have the textbook on the computer). She will probably get another one this coming school year so I was in hopes that I could get an alternative to work. I downloaded the latest versions of both of the alternative programs and tried them again today, just in case anything had changed in a newer version, but they still won't work with the textbook. So, why won't either alternative work and is there anything I can do to make them work?

Here is the situation: The textbook has its own folder on the computer. Inside that folder is a PDF file called "Start" and another folder called "Source" which contains a little over 230 PDF files (the textbook). If you open the "Start" PDF file with Adobe you can then click on the start page it brings up and peruse the textbook (the 230+ PDF files) in various ways starting from what I guess you would call the table of contents. The "Start" file ties all the other PDF files together and allows you to move chapter to chapter, search keywords, click links on the table of contents and go right to that chapter or lesson, etc, etc.

In both Foxit and PDF-X clicking on the "Start" PDF does nothing but open that PDF file and display the start page. Clicking on the start page then does nothing at all. The only way you can navigate the textbook in Foxit or PDF-X is to open each of the separate 230+ PDF files and look through them individually.

Any suggestions to make an alternative viewer work for her or a guess as to why the two alternatives to Adobe can't operate as it does in this situation? Is there some setting I need to change maybe, or are the alternative viewers still just not able to do everything that Adobe can?

 

I don't have an answer but I'd bet that if you could give this example to either Foxit or Tracker Software (PDF-XChange), they would include it in future builds. They have both been very progressive...

 

Maybe it's somewhat related to this: http://www.foxitsoftware.com/bbs/showthread.php?t=7779

 

http://www.techradar.com/news/computing/adobe-hands-over-copyright-to-pdf-format-416494

Maybe it will get better now.

 

Arup: Awesome news!

 

While I still don't know why Foxit or PDF-X won't work and Adobe will, I do know it is related to javascript. When I turn off javascript in Adobe it won't work with the "textbook" either. I made sure the javascript addon was installed in Foxit and javascript is already enabled in PDF-X but they won't work anyway. I guess there are just still some things that Adobe can do that the others can't.

@arup

Yeah, I had read that Adobe was releasing the PDF format the other day when I was looking on Digg. Very good news. Maybe that will allow them to fix my problem soon.

 

No solution, I'm afraid.

Recently, I found a PDF that will not display correctly, if at all, withAdobe Reader 8.1.2, but displays fine with the ancient Acrobat 5.

So, even Adobe will not open all files correctly.