FUTURE OF ADOBE: PDF

Michael Hankins

Overview

Areas PDFs are used History of Adobe Evolution of the PDF Present Day Adobe Software How the software has been adapted Development processes used Future of the PDF Conclusion

Areas PDFs are Used

Printing Industry Online Documents Online Forms Company Reports

History of Adobe

Founded in 1982 John Warnock and Charles Geschke

In 1984 they released Adobe Post Script

Evolution of PDF: PDF 1.0 80’s into early 90’s began refining Post

Script language and streamlining printing While refining created a file format that

used Post Script, PDF In June 1993 Adobe released file format Was released with software for creating

and viewing PDF 1.0

PDF 1.1

November 1994 Acrobat 2 came out Also the new file format PDF 1.1 was released New format came with some new functionality Later Acrobat 2.1 was released During this time the PDF had some

competitors

PDF 1.2

November 1996 Acrobat 3.0 was released along with PDF 1.2

First file format that print media companies could really use

It had some useful functionality for these companies

Other companies began releasing plug-ins to support this emerging file format

PDF 1.3

April 1999 Acrobat 4.0 and PDF 1.3 released File format came with new functionality Acrobat 4.0 also had new functionality This version was released with a lot of bugs By time of official release of the patch 100

million copies of Acrobat Reader downloaded

PDF 1.4

In 2000 PDF 1.4 was partially released with Illustrator 9

Illustrator had new functionality In May 2001 Acrobat 5 was released along

with PDF 1.4 being completely released Useful features in Acrobat 5 for both printing

businesses and the general user

PDF 1.5

May 2003 Acrobat 6 and PDF 1.5 released PDF 1.5 came with a few new features Acrobat 6 Pro with a lot of new functions

PDF 1.6

January 2005 Acrobat 7 and PDF 1.6 were shipped out

PDF 1.6 came with a variety of advancements

PDF 1.7

PDF 1.7 was mainly an improvement on already established options

Acrobat 8 released in October 2006 January 2008 PDF 1.7 became an ISO

standard Acrobat 9 was later released

PDF/VT

In 2010 Acrobat X was released Acrobat X came with some new features In Fall 2010 PDF/VT was released as a new

ISO standard PDF/VT stands for PDF Variable Transaction PDF/VT has some advancements & limitations

Present Day Adobe Software Adobe Acrobat XI

Adobe Reader XI

Adobe Reader Mobile Application

Adobe Acrobat XI

Acrobat XI released in 2012 It comes with some improved photo and text e

diting features It also has improved capability to save to a Wo

rd document Adobe also improved the Portfolio option

Adobe Reader XI

Adobe Reader XI released in 2012 Comes with some new features and

improvements Comes with a new way to sign forms

Adobe Reader Mobile Application This application can be run a variety of mobile

operating systems and devices It comes with features that take advantage of

the capabilities of the mobile device

Development Process/Security Adobe has a couple Development Teams

focused on product security Acrobat & Reader XI have a variety of security

features like Protected Mode & Protected View

Security: Protected Mode/View

Figure 1: Adobe Protected Mode/Protected View Sandbox Process [12]

Security Adobe Acrobat/Reader XI contd.

Figure 2: Acrobat/Reader XI Cross-domain Configuration Example [12]

Future of the PDF

A lot of challenges in the corporate world in the area of electronic files

PDF files are an example of something that meets a lot of those challenges

Now there are no files that are perfect for every stage in the content lifecycle

There are other file formats that can replace older authoring formats

Conclusion

Adobe and the file format it made, PDF, have a broad and diverse history

They also have a large user base in both the corporate world and the general public

With the PDF functionality and the tools Adobe has provided to interact with the PDF

With Adobe’s commitment to stay with/ahead of the times

Questions?