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Preface
The origins of the Portable Document Format and the Adobe® Acrobat® product
family date to early 1990. At that time, the PostScript® page description language
was rapidly becoming the worldwide standard for the production of the printed
page. PDF builds on the PostScript page description language by layering a docu-
ment structure and interactive navigation features on PostScript’s underlying im-
aging model, providing a convenient, efficient mechanism enabling documents
to be reliably viewed and printed anywhere.
The PDF specification was first published at the same time the first Acrobat prod-
ucts were introduced in 1993. Since then, updated versions of the specification
have been and continue to be available from Adobe on the World Wide Web. It
includes the precise documentation of the underlying imaging model from Post-
Script along with the PDF-specific features that are combined in version 1.7 of
the PDF standard.
Over the past eleven years, aided by the explosive growth of the Internet, PDF has
become the de facto standard for the electronic exchange of documents. Well over
500 million copies of the free Adobe Reader® software have been distributed
around the world, facilitating efficient sharing of digital content. In addition, PDF
is now the industry standard for the intermediate representation of printed mate-
rial in electronic prepress systems for conventional printing applications. As ma-
jor corporations, government agencies, and educational institutions streamline
their operations by replacing paper-based workflow with electronic exchange of
information, the impact and opportunity for the application of PDF will continue
to grow at a rapid pace.
PDF is the file format that underlies the Adobe® Intelligent Document Platform,
facilitating the process of creating, managing, securing, collecting, and exchang-
ing digital content on diverse platforms and devices. The Intelligent Document
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