Hello Malcolm

It is possible to create a link to both a PDF and a Word document.

And users can then download and process the files if they have the software installed on their own PC to do that.

A PDF file can be shown in an iframe and then it can be shown online. The viewing can be done either by software on the users PC or by software that is "delivered" from a server on the net.

If you want to use an editable document, then you should not use a Word document. I recommend that you use the Google Doc for that.

If you have a Google account ( gmail address ) then you should be able to create a document in Google Docs.

This document you can make accessible by other users - to view or to also edit. The viewing and/or the editing will be done online.

The code for embedding the document on a webpage, you can have Google Docs to create for you.

I made a link to show you, here : http://eksempelsite.dk/sparta02/testdoc.html

The document is created in Google Docs.

For the document you can specify gmail addresses  and/or Facebook accounts that should have access to edit the document. People will then be sent a link to the document and via this link, they can edit the document. Once they have made changes, the changes will be shown for all.

I think this will be the best way to publish a document that should be possible to edit.

There is also the possibility that you over the document publish a link. Then all that has access to the page will be able to edit the document. They will also be able to download it in various formats - including Word and PDF.

You can do pretty much the same with the document as you can in Word.

In Google Doc there is also a spreadsheet. This way you could have a list of members and then give special users access to edit the list.