Ask CRAFT: Downloading our PDFs

Craft & Design

If you have a question for Ask CRAFT, shoot me an email at becky@craftzine.com, or drop us a note on Twitter! We’d love to answer your crafty questions on any topic: technique, projects, crafty culture, or anything else! Each week the answers are here; include your name, where you’re from, and your website or blog if you have one!


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Many of you write us with problems downloading our PDF patterns. We realize this can be very frustrating, and we’re here to help!

So, you see a cool pattern and you want it for your very own. So you click the “download PDF pattern” link, but something goes wrong. We’ve heard it all, from “nothing happens,” to “the download fails,” to “I can’t find where it put the file.” Never fear. Here’s the sure-fire method for getting those pretty patterns in front of your eyeballs:

  • Right-click (or control-click on a Mac if you’ve only got one button) on the link.
  • Select “Save Target As…” or “Save Link As…” or “Save As…” (will depend on what browser you’re using).
  • A dialog box will show up to ask you where on your computer to save the file. Pick a place, any place, and click “Save.”
  • The file will download, but may or may not automatically open when complete, depending on your browser settings. If if doesn’t open by it self, go find it where you saved it to, and double click it to open it in your PDF viewer.

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You’re going to make sure you have a PDF viewer installed on your computer in order to open the pattern. These days, they all come with something capable of opening PDFs, possibly Acrobat Reader (which is free if you don’t have it already).

A note on browsers: We know from our analytics software that most of you use Firefox already, but there’s still a large portion of you using something else. We highly recommend downloading (free, open source, safe, totally rad) Firefox and using it to browse Craftzine. It handles downloads gracefully, so you can click click click to your hearts content without worrying about a stalled download or failed file launch.

We hope this helps you enjoy our free pattern podcasts!

What do you do to view our patterns? And what browser/PDF viewer configuration are you using? Share with us in the comments!

6 thoughts on “Ask CRAFT: Downloading our PDFs

  1. Kay says:

    OK, thank you for the instructions, and yes, they do work. HOWEVER, I have downloaded many, many pdfs, over a 20+ year engineering career, and this is the very first time in my memory that I have ever run into a situation where I could not just click on the link, have the pdf open in a new (or same) window, and just do a “File–>Save As”. (I’ve been doing this at least as long as the internet has been around… *grin*) And, my computer is Windows 7 running Mozilla Firefox as my browser.

  2. conniereed56 says:

    I continue to have problems, I have found the way to successfully download, now I am having problems opening the asp files. ASP files?????? why are they not downloading as pdf files? Why is acrobat not recognizing this format?

  3. anna fournier says:

    Tried, and tried, but it still doesn’t work. it won’t download the link at all, even when I right click and ‘save link’ it says the download has been interrupted. :(

  4. Angela says:

    I was able to print the pattern no problem… Now the question is how do I line all of the pages up? Do the pieces of paper just meet edge to edge or do I line up the triangles on the edges of the pages? Not sure how to go about it correctly…

  5. marylin burhans says:

    i am having troubles downloading this pattern can you please email it to me mikeandmarylin@charter.net tyvm

  6. Kat says:

    If you are using an android and you get a message saying download failed, try holding down on the pdf, then when the optons menu pops up, select open in new tab. It worked for me, using a Samsung Galaxy Note 4, and the samsung Internet app

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Becky Stern is a Content Creator at Autodesk/Instructables, and part time faculty at New York’s School of Visual Arts Products of Design grad program. Making and sharing are her two biggest passions, and she's created hundreds of free online DIY tutorials and videos, mostly about technology and its intersection with crafts. Find her @bekathwia on YouTube/Twitter/Instagram.

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