PDFs and Smokeball

Smokeball can be extremely helpful when editing, reviewing, and working with PDFs. While Smokeball is compatible with all PDF viewers, you should:

• Always save the PDF file to your matter before making any changes.
• Open a PDF from within the associated matter in Smokeball. This ensures that all your changes will be saved when using your PDF viewer’s save button. You do not need to save a PDF to your desktop and re-import the file so long as the PDF file is opened from within Smokeball first.  

If there is a publicly available Court & Authority, agency, or title insurer fillable PDF form you are looking to automate, first search in Forms & Templates. If a form is missing, Smokeball's team can add it into the library for PDF Automation. It is also possible to automate PDFs using Smokeball's PDF Automation.

How to save a PDF to Smokeball

There are three ways to save a PDF to Smokeball: 

1. You can save a PDF to Smokeball through Microsoft Outlook.
   • In Microsoft Outlook, right-click on the PDF file in the email and select “Save to Smokeball” from the menu. Select the matter associated with the PDF in the pop-up window.
      
   • Alternatively, use the Smokeball toolbar to first assign the email to a matter. Once the email is assigned to a matter, use the pop-up window to attach the PDF file. 
2. You can save a PDF to Smokeball through Google Chrome.
   • Install the Smokeball Chrome Extension.
   • Select the Smokeball icon in your Chrome browser and then select the Save the Page button.
   • Choose the matter associated with the PDF in the pop-up window.
3. You can import a PDF file to Smokeball from your computer.
   • Open a matter in Smokeball. Select the Import button and then choose Files from the drop-down menu.
   • Locate and select the PDF file you want to import in the pop-up window and then select the Open
   • Alternatively, drag and drop the PDF file from your computer into the documents section of the matter.

Alternatively, drag and drop the PDF file from your computer into the documents section of the matter.

How to work with PDFs in Smokeball

 Open a PDF that has been imported into Smokeball.

If you are using Adobe, navigate to Menu > Preferences > General and make sure that Show online storage when saving files is not checked.

Select the save icon on your PDF viewer to save your changes back to the matter. In the Adobe screenshot below, the save icon is a floppy disk.

You may see a dialog box to save the document to a temp file location. This ensures that the edits or changes are saved to Smokeball. If you see this prompt, always select Yes when prompted to replace the existing file

You can close the PDF. The PDF will be stored in your Smokeball matter. Smokeball will track a file history and activity will be recorded in Activity every time you work on the PDF.

Create a Non-Editable, Read-Only PDF 

You may also create a copy of a PDF document that cannot be edited by third parties. To do so, right-click on a PDF document in a matter and select the "Create read-only copy" menu item. 

A copy of the read-only PDF will be created and accessible to you in the matter's documents. 

Additional Resources

Learn more about PDF Automation and Template Creation.