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PDF/A and external references

November 2025 by Peter Wyatt

PDF/A ensures reliable long-term rendering by embedding fonts, images, and color profiles, but URLs can still appear in text, hyperlinks, bookmarks, annotations, metadata, and embedded files.

Link annotations and URI Actions define clickable destinations, but PDF/A restricts certain action types to prevent external dependencies.

Guided by clear policies, comprehensive audits of both visible and hidden references help maintain authenticity, accessibility, and long-term integrity of PDF/A documents and digital collections.

PDF/A ensures reliable long-term rendering by embedding fonts, images, and color profiles, but URLs can still appear in text, hyperlinks, bookmarks, annotations, metadata, and embedded files.

Link annotations and URI Actions define clickable destinations, but PDF/A restricts certain action types to prevent external dependencies.

Guided by clear policies, comprehensive audits of both visible and hidden references help maintain authenticity, accessibility, and long-term integrity of PDF/A documents and digital collections.

Watch the Electronic Document Conference presentations

August 2019 by PDF Association staff
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In June 2019, the Electronic Document Conference was held. All 44 presentations were video-recorded and are available for those who could not attend in person.

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August 2019 by Dietrich von Seggern
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This article was recently updated. The new version was posted on February 16, 2021. PDF is one of the most … Read more

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August 2019 by Elizabeth Thede
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Instead of retrieving and searching each file in its associated application, a search engine needs to review all files together … Read more

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July 2019 by Roman Toda (Normex)
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Users printing to PDF are throwing away information that could be reused by downstream applications. Find out how “Deriving HTML … Read more

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July 2019 by Duff Johnson
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After an impressive effort the Mueller Report is now available as a free EPUB file. What might have been in … Read more

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July 2019 by PDF Association staff
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The Open Preservation Foundation, a PDF Association liaison member, has announced the 1.14 release of the open source, industry-supported PDF/A validator, part … Read more

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July 2019 by Frode Hegland
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The Visual-Meta approach take the metadata out of of the document internals and presents it as an appendix at the … Read more

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July 2019 by Duff Johnson
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What are the essential characteristics and optimal functional requirements of email messages and necessary related information in a PDF technology-based … Read more

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June 2019 by Dietrich von Seggern (callas software GmbH)
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Dietrich von Seggern from callas software is just back from Electronic Document Conference (EDC) in Seattle. His short summary: It … Read more

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June 2019 by Roman Toda
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For the two most common web formats – HTML and PDF – the relationship hasn’t been easy. Whenever PDF is … Read more

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June 2019 by Duff Johnson
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The SafeDocs research is intended to result in novel parser methodologies to ensure security in digital content.

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