how to extract text from a pdf file.

You can't, without a full Acrobat product. Also it is possible that will require a password to unprotect this document.
(I hear about some hacker tools)

The full version of Adobe Acrobat (not the free Adobe Acrobat Reader) will allow you to open, modify and convert PDF files. Whether you can legally or morally do this depends entirely upon the circumstances. If the document states "content extraction or copying is not allowed", you should obtain permissions or you may be legally liable.

hello, if you want to get just the text and not the Graphics then you can easily do it by opening the PDF document in the Acrobat Reader (i know about 5.0 but dont kno about the older versions). an then copy the whole document by "CTRL+A" and then just pasting the copied stuff in Microsoft Word. this works fine with Acrobat Reader 5.0 and Office XP, and hopefully it will work with older versions also.

but remember this will only copy the text and not the Graphics.

you can create the PDF files in Acrobat PageMaker. so hopefully it should also have the option to edit an existing document. but like already stated you might require some kind of permission for documents that are secure or password protected.

Hope this helps.