easy-peasy html 2 pdf

PDF can be an annoyance at times, but it's usually not terrible. It's convenient because it is widely viewable and can embed images and styles and what not. If you're distributing information via email, those factors can make it a win.

Pdfcrowd is an easy way to make a PDF from an html file - it seems to be pretty darn robust in the HTML it handles, from my 15-year-old HTML of my blog to a scheduling table that used a ton of absolute positioning for elements.

The site can be used as simply as entering a URL, but the page I wanted was password protected. So I "Save Page As"d in chrome, then made a new folder containing the html document and its supporting files, zip'd that, uploaded at pdfcrowd and got something like this:

(or rather, that's a screenshot of a PDF reader looking at a parallel process for my public site.)

The free version adds the watermark/site name at the bottom and doesn't have many formatting options, but for quick and dirty it can't be beat.

In the comments Jeremy pointed out that the standard OSX Print dialog has a "Save as PDF" option which is even more convenient, but makes a printer-friendly ink saving version, where colored backgrounds get replaced with outlines. Good to have both techniques in mind!