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First of all, I don't know if this is not a place for asking this question or whether it has been asked (I have searched before posting). My apology is these cases.

I felt very often to save all discussions (including answers) about a question permanently in my computer. Thats why the question. I have seen many journals (e.g., Nature) have an option "download pdf", while seeing the article in their site. It would be great, if this facility can be made available.

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The second best thing you can do is to use StackPrinter along with a PDF printer like this...

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    $\begingroup$ I have to say that this is a crappy solution. $\endgroup$
    – Asaf Karagila Mod
    Oct 12, 2011 at 15:54
  • $\begingroup$ Hence "second best". Unless the SE overlords actually grant this wi- er, request, then you've no other way to get a PDF of an SE thread... $\endgroup$
    – J. M. ain't a mathematician
    Oct 12, 2011 at 16:09
  • $\begingroup$ @J.M. Thanks for the tip. Actually I have many professional version of softwares to convert anything printable into pdf (including Nitro and adobe). But the direct conversion always looks ugly (it never keeps the original format). $\endgroup$
    – Tapu
    Oct 12, 2011 at 16:38
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    $\begingroup$ @Swapan: In that case, I suppose I should change "second best" to "somewhat shabby"... $\endgroup$
    – J. M. ain't a mathematician
    Oct 12, 2011 at 17:50
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    $\begingroup$ @Asaf, I accepted the answer, because it is the best available at present from this site. $\endgroup$
    – Tapu
    Oct 12, 2011 at 21:05
  • $\begingroup$ Swapan, maybe you could also vote it up? It looks funny to see an accepted answer with no upvotes. $\endgroup$
    – Gerry Myerson
    Oct 12, 2011 at 21:40
  • $\begingroup$ Sure, I did it just now! But someone has downvoted :( $\endgroup$
    – Tapu
    Oct 12, 2011 at 21:47
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    $\begingroup$ +1 A PDF download link would be better but I would not call it a crappy solution. Installing the StackPrinter bookmarklet in your browser and with a proper PDF printer on your machine (With OSX you have it natively) you could download your pdf in two click, one for printing the question on Stackprinter and one for save the pdf. After all you have just one more click than a SE fully integrated solution :), not a big deal. $\endgroup$
    – systempuntoout
    Oct 13, 2011 at 7:15
  • $\begingroup$ @systempuntoout, It looks you are the correct fellow to whom this question was directed. It seems, at present SP does not use any inbuild pdf converter and rely on what is installed in user's computer. Thats why the conversion sometimes looks ugly. For example, I have adobe (MSW 7 OS) and it neither keeps the original format, nor the hyperlinks. $\endgroup$
    – Tapu
    Oct 13, 2011 at 7:30
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    $\begingroup$ Yes I am and if you read this question you will see where StackPrinter idea has started (That feature-request looks familiar, isn't it?). StackPrinter offers just Html and what happens after this is out of my control :). I'm curious to see what is the result of your printing, can you upload it somewhere? I have saved tons of pdf for my personal Ebook on OSX and I have never had a problem. Maybe you could try to install another PDF printer. $\endgroup$
    – systempuntoout
    Oct 13, 2011 at 7:49
  • $\begingroup$ @systempuntoout, After changing some options in the adobe printer, the SE Printer works pretty fine (both formatting and hyperlinks are ok now). About the question you linked: I am sure someone will request .mobi/djvu (or some .xyz) format soon or later :) I requested for pdf, becuase most journals like them. For conversion to other formats, ppl can use different softwares (e.g., Calibre, a frre handy software). $\endgroup$
    – Tapu
    Oct 13, 2011 at 14:58
  • $\begingroup$ @Swapan I'm happy you have fixed your pdf problem; I'm a Calibre user, pretty handy piece of software :) $\endgroup$
    – systempuntoout
    Oct 13, 2011 at 15:05
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    $\begingroup$ @systempuntoout I believe it would be helpful to link the SE Printer (so that it become accessible from everywhere) on every page, most probably at the bottom where the other links are available. Honestly, without J.M.'s help, perhaps I would not be able to find that link. $\endgroup$
    – Tapu
    Oct 13, 2011 at 18:31
  • $\begingroup$ well, what is the first thing then? $\endgroup$
    – user3459110
    Jul 4, 2014 at 12:16
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You could try this:
Copy the source(markdown/mathjax) of an answer/question, paste it into this markdown/mathjax editor (http://benweet.github.io/stackedit/) and then save as pdf.

I'm not sure how good this pdf converter is, but I tried to convert this answer and it looks good: https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/58922976/Answer-%20Is%20dy-dx%20not%20a%20ratio-.pdf

You can also try this html2pdf converter (http://www.html2pdf.it/).

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I've saved tons of questions from MathOverflow but it works the same here too. In Firefox (hopefully other browsers as well), you can just print the page as a PDF ("Print to File"). It's just a couple of clicks.

The formatting is only slightly weird, but definitely good enough to read and doesn't even print the side stuff like the "Related Questions". For better results you might want to use the MathJax "Render as SVG".

If you use this option, the PDF you get is practically the same as the page itself. You can make it look even nicer by removing the headers/footers so that the URL isn't printed near the top.

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