The history of PDF

2008: Acrobat 9 sticks to PDF 1.7 ‘Adobe Extension Level 3′

Since the ISO-organisation now controls the PDF-standard, Adobe couldn’t introduce a new PDF 1.8 file format with the release of Acrobat 9, code named ‘Nova’ in June 2008. The PDF file format is pretty flexible however and it allows for the use of extensions – data that might have value to a certain application but that other software can simply ignore. Acrobat 9 PDF files are enhanced with such extensions, called Adobe Extension Level 3.  This extension can be used to embed geospatial data in a PDF file, something that is useful for maps. At the moment of writing, the Acrobat 9 SDK hadn’t been released yet so I don’t know which other features Extension Level 3 has.

It seems logical that Adobe will keep adding new features to PDF using such extensions, simply to add extra value to new releases of Acrobat. They may propose that some of them make it into new ISO-certified PDF releases. Of course other companies can do the same or may request changes to Adobe’s proposals. The PDF standard will continue to evolve but since more companies & organizations can now get involved and committees by nature work much slower, there won’t be a new PDF version every 18 months.

I haven’t been using Acrobat 9 long yet but according to sources, such as this thread on the b4print forums, the Professional version is an interesting product for prepress professionals:

• Acrobat 9 Professional offers good support for industry standards such as PDF/X-4 or GWG.
• The application allows you to embed multiple files and data types into a Portfolio, which is similar to a ZIP file. It is unclear if this way of bundling data will become popular.
• For a whole slew of common issues, there is no longer a need to revert to plug-ins as Acrobat 9 itself has the tools on board. A few examples:
  • The Touch Up Text Tool now supports word wrap (even though using it is still a hit-and-miss affair).
  • The Crop Tool lets you define the ArtBox, BleedBox, CropBox or TrimBox.
  • The ‘Convert Colors’ tool is more powerful and faster. It also seems to have less issues with transparent objects.
  • Using the ‘Examine Document’ menu option you can delete all objects that are completely outside the page are (CropBox) or trim area (TrimBox).

• ‘Output preview’ can simulate the effect of varying press conditions.
• The application seems to run faster on Macs.
• One small thing to keep in mind: ‘Overprint Preview’ is set for ‘Only for PDF/x files’ as default. Changing this to ‘Always’ is more reliable but slows down the application. Check out this blog for more background information.
• Of course there are also a number of features that target other markets besides print. Support for AES-256 encryption is an example of this.

The future of PDF

The ISO-committee is currently working on the specifications of PDF 2.0. This standard is expected to be released in early 2012. It will apparently be a minor refinement of the existing PDF 1.7 specifications. I have been told that PDF 2.0 will not incorporate any of the ideas from Mars. Mars was an Adobe project which focused on using XML as the internal data format within PDF documents. The main advantage of using XML as the internal format for PDF files would be that programmers would be able to use the incredible number of XML-tools and technologies that are available on the market to create or process PDF files.

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