Preventing Printing of Content

I am wondering if there is a way to prevent printing of content by our Members using S2Member? We have a manual which we have in .pdf format. I know that with pdf’s one is able to disable printing. Is this possible in S2Member?

Please advise.

Hello Robert,

I’m afraid this is not possible with s2Member. I’m not sure it’s even possible at all with web applications.

The only thing that can restrict the user from printing is the browser itself and other softwares that stop those transactions, prohibiting printing of a file (from within the file itself) would make sense if it was possible.

However, I repeat, this is not possible with s2Member, and maybe will never be.

– Eduan

Eduan,

Could I use .pdf files as my “content” on S2Member? Meaning instead of putting text posts with WordPress, could I use .pdf files that are only able to accessed by my paying customers (protected content) that are actually on my site, where they can open them somehow on my site, and read them? What I want to prevent is two things:

1.) The files being downloaded

2.) Files being printed (with .pdf files I can also prevent them from being printed when I use security that prevents printing of the file when the .pdf’s are created).

Is this possible?

Please advise.
Robert

Yes, you can protect downloads. Check this video for a lot (not all of it though) of info on this:
Video » s2Member® File Downloads (Complete Series)

I can’t provide any help on preventing users from printing the PDF files, so that’s up to you. :)

Ok, that’s good, but my additional part of that question was, can I somehow embed the .pdf’s on the site so they can only be read on my site? In other words, the Member/Customer can read them but only on our site. If they can’t download them, they need to be able to open them and read them obviously :).

The part about preventing printing is an Adobe feature and I’m good with that, if I can make the other part of this work with S2Member.

Ah, at that point I’m afraid it’s not possible.

You can prevent the downloading, in order for them to pay before being able to open/download the PDF file.

However if you want to embed it into your website then it’s not possible, because, once again, you can’t restrict them from printing something online, unless the browser or some other software prevents it.

You will need to offer the PDFs for download (paid download), and in exchange, in order to not allow them to print the files, you will need to block it somehow with Adobe or whatever you use.

– Eduan

Let’s forget the printing for a moment – I can do that with Acrobat.

Here’s what I’m curious about – can I have pdf’s on my website that they can only read, but not download, that are still protected?

Hi Robert.

I’m pretty sure that if the person can open the file, he can also save it. To open it, the file already needs to be downloaded.