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The PDF Association celebrates its members’ public statements
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Twenty Years of Trust: Celebrating the 20th Anniversary of PDF/A-1

November 2025 by PDF Association staff

This month the PDF industry is celebrating the 20th anniversary of PDF/A-1 (ISO 19005-1:2005), the publication of which revolutionized digital preservation.

Before this standard, archiving suffered from dependency issues. PDF/A-1, based on a constrained subset of PDF 1.4, mandated self-contained, device-independent documents. These rules ensure that a PDF/A document’s appearance can be reliably maintained over centuries, regardless of viewing software.

Rapidly adopted globally, the principles established in PDF/A-1 persist in later standards like PDF/A-4, which is based on PDF 2.0, the latest ISO standard for PDF.

Happy 20th, PDF/A! We (ok, not us personally) fully expect to be celebrating your 200th anniversary in November 2225!

This month the PDF industry is celebrating the 20th anniversary of PDF/A-1 (ISO 19005-1:2005), the publication of which revolutionized digital preservation.

Before this standard, archiving suffered from dependency issues. PDF/A-1, based on a constrained subset of PDF 1.4, mandated self-contained, device-independent documents. These rules ensure that a PDF/A document’s appearance can be reliably maintained over centuries, regardless of viewing software.

Rapidly adopted globally, the principles established in PDF/A-1 persist in later standards like PDF/A-4, which is based on PDF 2.0, the latest ISO standard for PDF.

Happy 20th, PDF/A! We (ok, not us personally) fully expect to be celebrating your 200th anniversary in November 2225!

PDF 2.0 Interop Workshops: Request, Test and Assess

April 2018 by PDF Association staff
Article


To maximize both the opportunities and the benefits of testing, the third PDF 2.0 interop workshop makes it possible for developers of PDF consumer products to ask for and discuss … Read more

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March 2018 by PDF Association staff
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PDF Days Europe, the annual PDF technology education event, will take place from 14 to 16 May 2018 in Berlin … Read more

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March 2018 by PDF Association staff
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PDF Days Europe, the annual PDF technology education event, will take place from 14 to 16 May 2018 in Berlin … Read more

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February 2018 by PDF Association staff
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Following the success of our previous interop workshops in Cambridge, England and Boston, Massachusetts, the 3rd PDF 2.0 Interop Workshop … Read more

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February 2018 by PDF Association staff
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Fittingly for the tenth anniversary of PDF’ becoming an ISO standard, standardization will play a significant role this year. The … Read more

Article, PDF Association news

February 2018 by PDF Association staff
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Richard Cohn, Principal Scientist at Adobe, one of the two co-authors of the original PDF specification in the era of … Read more

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February 2018 by Duff Johnson
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Introduction PDF technology profiles can be leveraged to provide trusted, predictable containers for record types that often present workflow and … Read more

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January 2018 by PDF Association staff
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The PDF Association returns to Washington DC next Monday, January 29, 2018 for PDF Day DC, a single day packed … Read more

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December 2017 by Duff Johnson
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PDF files deliver a complete package of information that defines a document; everything that’s needed to represent the text, graphics … Read more

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December 2017 by Duff Johnson
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What is a “document”? A document is a record of some (typically written) content – a publication, a contract, a … Read more

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November 2017 by Duff Johnson
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It’s a question that vexes vendors of web-based solutions everywhere: why do people still insist on PDF files? And why … Read more

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