PDF File Conversion and Viewers

Snowbound Software’s products offers powerful, flexible support for PDF documents tailored to your development and business needs. Our technology allows access to PDF documents from memory or a directory and is contained in a compact library under 1 MB.  The library supports both Type 1 and Type 2 fonts.

• RasterMaster Imaging SDK – Build PDF viewing, manipulation, and conversion, including fully-searchable PDF files, into your applications.
• VirtualViewer Document Processing Application – Quickly view, annotate, and print PDF files through a standard Web browser.
• SnowBatch Batch Conversion – Faster file conversion to PDF right from your desktop or server.

The PDF Format

PDF or Portable Document Format is a file format developed by Adobe Systems, for representing two-dimensional documents in a device/resolution independent fixed-layout document format. The format is highly portable across computer platforms. PDF captures formatting information from a variety of desktop publishing applications making it possible to view documents (through a monitor or printer) as they were intended to be viewed. PDF documents maintain the original font, images and layout of the original file and are traditionally viewed using Adobe’s free Adobe Reader software, which can be used regardless of operating system, original design application or fonts.

The advantage with PDF is that the PDF file is not subject to the vagaries or other document formats. Adobe holds a number of patents relating to the PDF format and licenses them on a royalty-free basis for use in developing software that complies with its PDF specification. This is another advantage to PDF as anyone may create applications that read and write PDF files without having to pay royalties to Adobe Systems

PDF is primarily the combination of three technologies:

• a sub-set of the PostScript page description programming language, for generating the layout and graphics
• a font-embedding/replacement system to allow fonts to travel with the documents
• a structured storage system to bundle these elements and any associated content into a single file, with data compression where appropriate.

The Evolution of PDF

When PDF first came out in the early 1990s, it was slow to catch on. Adobe launched its Acrobat 1.0 (and PDF 1.0) product line in 1993. The first Acrobat products were touted as being "a PostScript-based file format that can describe documents in a completely device and resolution independent manner." At the time, not only did the only PDF creation tools of the time (Acrobat) cost money, but so did the software to view and print PDF files. Additionally, there were competing formats such as Envoy, Common Ground Digital Paper, DjVu and even Adobe's own PostScript format (.ps).

Adobe soon started distributing the Acrobat Reader (now Adobe Reader) program at no cost, and continued to support PDF through years of ramp-up and development. In addition to an evolving distribution method, the products themselves evolved from simply allowing you to view and print a document to providing a way to extract specific selections of text or images from the file, password-protect areas of the document, and much more.

Today, Adobe PDF has achieved widespread use and is now a streamlined format for exchanging documents.  One notable high ranking success is the adoption of PDF as the standard format for the electronic submission of drug approvals to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and for electronic case filings in U.S. federal courts.

Additional Resources for the PDF File Format on our website

• PDF to TIFF - Streamline workflow and standardize how images are viewed across your organization.
• PDF to JPEG - Convert PDF to JPEG directly and rapidly, without having to invoke a print driver or any other external application.
• AFP to PDF - Create applications that directly convert IBM ImagePlus MO:DCA (AFP, IOCA and PTOCA) documents to searchable PDF.
• MS Word to PDF - quickly and efficiently convert and standardize their documents from MS Word to PDF files for easy archiving and display
• Snowbound Tech Tips: 
  
  
  • Using Java Based Samples to Convert PDF to TIFF
  • Converting a File to Vector PDF Format
  • Saving to a Searchable PDF File
  • Adjusting DPI When Converting a TIFF to a PDF
• Article: Document and imaging considerations for businesses
• Snowbound Software solutions for image conversion
• Press Release: Snowbound Software Enhances PDF With Powerful Vector Support
  

Notes:

• PDF writing is standard in all Snowbound Extended Library RasterMaster and FlexSnap products. PDF reading is an added cost option.
• Snowbound's Java PDF technology requires JVM/JRE version 1.3 or higher.
• Our library supports Type 1 and Type 2 fonts.
• Our library does not support double-byte or composite fonts.

References:

• All About Adobe PDF
• Adobe PDF Technology Center

Important: As we all know document and image specifications are intentionally loosely written and rarely updated. As a result many applications create documents “incorrectly” and they do not adhere to the latest specifications.

In order to maintain the highest ethical standards and help provide customers with the most positive user experience, Snowbound Software recommends that, as part of your purchase process, you test your own sample documents against our products.  Snowbound, unlike most competitors, develops its own technology. If in the rare case you come across a problem or non-conforming document or image, we can often fix it.