Document Viewers (PostScript, PDF, and DVI)

Though located under Graphic headings in both the main menu and the Start Here window, PostScript, PDF, and DVI viewers are more commonly used with Office applications (see Table 11-5). Linux features a tool called Ghostview that can display any PostScript file. Several applications can view both Adobe PDF and PostScript files. PostScript (.ps) and PDF (.pdf) files can be displayed using GNOME Ghostview (GVV) or KGhostView. Another application, xpdf, displays only PDF files. Alternatively, you can download Acrobat reader for Linux from Adobe to display PDF and PostScript files. All these viewers also have the ability to print PDF and PostScript documents.

Table 11-5: PostScript, PDF, and DVI viewers

Viewer	Description
GNOME Ghostview (GGV)	GNOME interface for displaying PostScript and PDF files
KGhostView	KDE interface for displaying PostScript and PDF files
xpdf	X Window System tool for displaying PDF files only
KDVI	KDE tool for displaying TeX DVI files (plug-in to KViewShell)
Acrobat Reader	Adobe PDF and PostScript display application

Linux also features a professional-level typesetting tool, called TeX, commonly used to compose complex mathematical formulas. TeX generates a DVI document that can then be viewed by DVI viewers, of which there are several for Linux. DVI files generated by the TeX document application can be viewed by KDVI. KDVI is a plug-in to the KViewShell tool that can display and print any kind of document for which it has a plug-in. You can access KDVI as the DVI Viewer in the Graphics menu.

These applications are available under the Graphics submenu. xpdf bears the name PDF viewer, GVV uses the name Postscript viewer, KGhostView is named PS/PDF viewer (More Graphic Applications), and KDVI is called DVI viewer.