Better PDF reader

[Baker]

There are few applications I hate because I consider them rude:

1. Java. Every time I visit a page with Java I can tell because I get an hour glass and everything goes very slow.

2. PDF. I've run across several PDFs that have crashed my browser -- sometimes when I have a lot of different tabs and Windows open. Plus Adobe reader is slow as hell, which I also don't like.

As a result, I don't have Java installed.

But the PDF thing is sometimes a problem with that uninstalled. You can run into things that are PDF only that you really need, like manuals or forms, occasionally.

Sumatra PDF viewer by Krzysztof Kowalczyk

I ran into a free and open source PDF that is not only lightning fast, but it's only 1.1 MB uncompressed and happens to be open source as well (which I really don't care about per se, except that ensures no adware or discontinuation).

It has no file dependencies either and it is super fast.

Now I can hopefully permanently ditch Adobe PDF which has got slower and slower and slower and more bloated and crash prone with every new version.

[Spirit]

If Sumatra turns out to be too plain, try the free Foxit one. I'm using it for ~3 years when I am in Windows and also installed it to everyone where I could with no problems: Foxit Software

And just disable Java in your browser, whenever you reach a site where you explictly want a Java applet to run it is quickly re-enabled but won't annoy you on random sites. You could use Noscript (if you use Firefox), but I find that addon incredibly annoyingly made. I guess you could use Ad-Block Plus to block *.java (or similar), but I am not sure what the extension(s) would be.