october 2006 impact of pdf/a on content management by christy hubbard

2006 Adobe Systems Incorporated. All Rights Reserved.

The Impact of PDF/Archiving on Content Management

Christy Hubbard

Sr. Product Marketing Manager, Adobe Systems


Agenda

What brought us here?

Considerations re: document formats

PDF/A specifics

Update on adoption and futures


The Preservation Problem

Costs associated with preservation

Electronic records becoming reality in today’s environment

What is the best option for preserving electronic documents over archival time spans?

TIFF?

Native Formats?

PDF?

XML?


Key characteristics needed for long-term document preservation

Device IndependentCan be reliably and consistently rendered without regard to the hardware or software platform

Self-containedContains all resources necessary for rendering

Self-documentingContains its own description

UnfetteredAbsence of technical file protection mechanisms

AvailableAuthoritative specification publicly available

AdoptionWidespread use may be the best deterrent against preservation risk

» TIFF?

» Native Formats?

» PDF?

» XML?


Why Not Archive “any” PDF?

PDF by itself is not suitable as an archival format Can include features incompatible with current archival requirements

Encryption

Embedded files

PDF documents not necessarily self-contained

Can depend on system fonts and other content drawn from outside the file

Multiple PDF development tools on the market

Inconsistency in the file format (all PDFs are not created equal)


Why a “Standard” Version of PDF?

Needed to ensure preservation of PDF documents over extended periods of time, and further ensure that PDF documents will be rendered with consistent and predictable results in the future

PDF is too powerful and flexible

Higher degree of reliability than required by the published specification

Compatibility into the future

Reliable migration

Developed and maintained by an external organization


What is PDF/A?

Final archiving format - not living documents

International Standard specifies the use of the Portable Document Format (PDF) suitable for the long-term preservation of electronic documents.

Long term preservation of black and white and color compound documents as electronic data

Based on the business and technical needs of governments, regulated industries, corporations, educational institutions and libraries

PDF/A does not address

specific physical methods of storing these documents such as the media and storage conditions

required computer hardware

operating systems


Why PDF/A Matters

Lower the cost of your archiving infrastructure

Replacing multiple formats with a single format to support

Open-standards ensures a variety of platforms can be used

Eliminate the overhead of less efficient standards

Increase the value of your archived documents

Leverage the full-fidelity of PDF and the archive standards of PDF/A to integrate archiving, presentment and external retrieval

ISO endorsement secures long-term viability of PDF/A archives

Mitigate compliance risks

Anticipate potential move towards PDF/A archiving guidelines

Provide rapid access to documents for regulatory, legal and law enforcement inquiries

Enable retention policies to dispose of qualifying documents


PDF/A Specifies

Subset of the PDF Reference Version 1.4

PDF/A

PDF 1.4 Reference

Specifies required featuresSpecifies recommended features

Specifies prohibited features


How PDF/A differs from PDF

Promotes/Recommends:• Persistent, device-independent format• Committee based development• 3rd party solutions• Use of metadata• Lossless compression• Valid structure tags (PDF/A-1a)

Promotes/Recommends:• Persistent, device-independent format• Committee based development• 3rd party solutions• Use of metadata• Lossless compression• Valid structure tags (PDF/A-1a)

Requires:• Preserve the visual appearance (PDF/A-1b) • Embedding of all fonts• Annotations to be clearly identifiable

Requires:• Preserve the visual appearance (PDF/A-1b) • Embedding of all fonts• Annotations to be clearly identifiable

Prohibits:• Encryption and password protection• Embedded dynamic objects• Proprietary or non-embeddable fonts• External links

Prohibits:• Encryption and password protection• Embedded dynamic objects• Proprietary or non-embeddable fonts• External links


Some detail of PDF/A Requirements

File should be

Unambiguous, predictable

Self-contained – no references

Stable presentation (no dynamic action or forms)

Uniform file format (header, trailer, no encryption)

Device-independent rendering of graphics

Embedded fonts, character encoding

Transparency prohibited

Only elements of PDF1.4 allowed…no extensions

Two levels of conformance1a Full (e.g. Tagged PDF)

1b Minimal (e.g. not Tagged PDF)

Annotations restricted to known annotation types

External actions restricted, no dependence on external content

Readers not required to act on hyperlinks, but may

XMP metadata “Adobe XML Metadata Framework”

Forms based on appearance, not data


Current Participants – partial list

Administrative Office of the US Courts

AFNOR

AIIM

ANSI

Appligent

BSI

EMC/Documentum

Glaxo Smith Kline

Global Graphics

Harvard University

Hewlett Packard

Honeywell

IBM

Image Solutions

IRS

Library of Congress

Merck

National Archives – US, UK, Sweden

NPES

PDF Sages

Pfizer

Victoria Archives, Australia

Xerox


Government Use of PDF/A (to date)

SwedenNational Archives

FranceMinistry of Equipement/Sonactra

Ministry of Finance/ADAE, Ministry of Finance/DGI

Ministry of Health

EDG GDF/GDMI (nuclear sites)

AFNOR

USANational Archives and Records AdministrationCurrently accepts PDF but will accept PDF/A according to their PDF Transfer Guidelines


Current Status & Timeline

Work organized by accredited standards bodiesAIIM International (the Association for Information and Image Management)

NPES (The Association for Suppliers of Printing, Publishing and Converting Technologies)

International Standards Organization (ISO) statusRatified May 2005; final standard published by ISO in September 2005

Working group has started defining next version (to be based on PDF 1.6 reference)

Supported by multiple vendors and products:Adobe Acrobat 8, Acrobat 3D, LiveCycle PDF Generator – www.adobe.com/

Visioneer - www.visioneer.com/

LuraTech - www.luratech.com/

Compart Systemhaus GmbH - www.compart.net

PDF Tools AG - www.pdf-tools.com

More information: www.aiim.org/standards

PDF/A-1a

PDF/A-1b

http://www.adobe.com/

http://www.visioneer.com/

http://www.luratech.com/

http://www.compart.net/

http://www.pdf-tools.com/

http://www.aiim.org/standards


Considerations for Next Versions of PDF/A

Based on PDF 1.6

The following specific features are under consideration for inclusion in Part 2 & Part 3

JPEG 2000 image compression

More sophisticated digital signature support

OpenType fonts

3D graphics

Audio/video content

Consistency with PDF/X, PDF/E, PDF/UA


Get the details

Developed and maintained by a recognized standards organization

Standard defines:

Prohibited features

Required features

Recommended features

Levels of conformance

PDF/A-1a

PDF/A-1b

Go to:

www.aiim.org/bookstore or www.npes.org

http://www.aiim.org/bookstore

http://www.npes.org/


PDF/A

— PDF Zone.com, 3/2004

If this committee presses forward with its plans to standardize PDF for archival purposes, gets PDF-A codified as an ISO standard and everyone calling for PDF/A adopts it . . . PDF has a good shot to exist far into the future, perhaps even beyond the lifecycle of Microsoft Windows.

october 2006 impact of pdf/a on content management by christy hubbard

Technology