Apple's Own 64-bit Applications: Preview

By Francine Schwieder

Preview

Probably everyone uses Apple's Preview at least occasionally. After all, it is a quick and handy way to take a look at PDFs and various and sundry graphic files. It launches almost instantaneously, and will let you view most PDF and graphic files you are likely to encounter, either on the web, with email, or things you create yourself or acquire from a camera or scanner.

It will open nearly all PDF files created by various Adobe applications (although it has been possible to use the latest greatest Adobe Acrobat Pro to create something that Preview either can't open, or can't open correctly), plus all the PDF files created by using the Print to PDF function on your Mac. It handles all commonly seen graphic file formats, as well as some very specialized formats. Here's a listing of files Preview claims it will open:

• PDF
• TIFF
• Camera RAW (which types are supported is updated with system updates)
• Xbitmap Images
• Open EXR Images
• Bitmap Images
• GIF
• Microsoft ICO images
• JPEG
• PICT
• PNG
• QuickTime Image
• TGA Images
• SGI Image
• Photoshop PSD
• MacPaint Images
• Kodak Flashpix Images
• Fax
• ICNS icon image files
• JPEG 2000
• Radiance images (an HDR image format)
• Collada Digital Asset Exchange files

Quite a list! There are things Preview will open that, although I have heard of them, I've never actually had such a file on my computer--not to mention things I haven't heard of at all, let alone run into anywhere. Several of the items are really old formats that you are unlikely to see, such as PICT, MacPaint or Silicon Graphics Image files. These can't be opened in Preview in Snow Leopard unless you run Preview in 32-bit mode, rather than the normal 64-bit.

To do that, quit Preview, if it is running, go to the Applications folder, select Preview and do GetInfo on it. If necessary expand the General section at the top and then click the box for Open in 32-bit mode. You'll probably want to convert these old images into some newer format, such as Photoshop or TIFF. After you've done that, quit Preview and go back to GetInfo and re-click the selection box to uncheck it and return Preview to 64-bit mode.

There are several ways to open files in Preview:

1. Use the Open file option in the File menu and navigate to the file
2. If the Finder window with the file is already open, you can drag and drop the file into the Open dialog box
3. You don't even need to bother with Open at all, just drop the file on the Preview icon in the Dock
4. Drag and drop on the icon in the Dock is probably the best method if you want to open multiple files in a single Preview window
5. And the simplest: if Preview is set as the default to open the file type, you can simply double click the file you want to open