Adobe PDF Library SDK FAQ

Adobe® PDF Library SDK

When should I use the Adobe PDF Library software development kit (SDK)?
The Adobe PDF Library (fully compatible with Acrobat DC) provides the core PDF manipulation
functionality of Adobe Acrobat® software in an API format. It is suitable for embedding basic Acrobat
functionality such as creating, editing, assembling, and printing PDF documents from within third-party
applications. The PDF Library provides technology that can be fully integrated with another application. Use
the Adobe PDF Library SDK when you need to integrate Adobe PDF functionality with your solutions in a
client and/or serverenvironment. The Adobe PDF Library does not provide access to extended Acrobat
functionality such as digital signatures, annotations, or plug-ins. If you require these advanced features, use
Acrobat instead. Developing with Acrobat requires users to have a copy of Acrobat on their computers.
Whenever feasible and practical, you should use Adobe applications such as Adobe Acrobat, Reader® and
LiveCycle® ES to support PDF capabilities inyour solutions. To develop plug-ins for Acrobat and Reader,
please use the Acrobat SDK.

How is using the Adobe PDF Library superior to developing my own PDF support?
The Adobe PDF Library helps remove the burden of understanding and maintaining support for the underlying
PDF standard, allowing developers to focus their core competencies on building robust business solutions. PDF
files created with the PDF Library are high quality and standards based. The library can read any valid PDF file
created by other sources, and it will remain current with future versions of the PDF specification. The SDK also
provides rich support for the core PDF manipulation functionality in Acrobat. In short, the Adobe PDF Library
helps developers and enterprises save time and money.

What Adobe PDF functionality does the Adobe PDF Library provide?
The Adobe PDF Library provides access to a wide range of PDF functionality. The most commonly used
functions are:

• Create • Print
• Edit • View and render
• Assemble documents • Linearize and optimize
• Use fonts • Compress
• Use forms • Extract content
• Use layers • Search and index
• Determine prepress workflows • Convert to PDF/A and PDF/X standards
• Flatten transparencies

Is there a new version of the Adobe PDF Library that matches the Acrobat DC product line?
Yes. Adobe PDF Library is based on the same underlying PDF technology and code base as the Acrobat DC
family of products. Additionally, PDF Library can create and consume PDF 1.7 and 2.0, the version of PDF
generated by Acrobat DC.
What are the new features in Adobe PDF Library?
• Support for UTF-8 character encoding as per PDF 2.0 specification has been added
• From 18.0.3 onwards, Mac Builds are BAST V3 signed following the Apple Notarization Guidelines
• Support for new era glyph – Updated CMaps and Font resources to support Japanese new era characters.
• Support for Windows 7 has been discontinued.
• PDEExtGStateGetSoftMaskMatrix and PDEExtGStateSetSoftMaskMatrix APIs have been added to get and set
the soft mask matrix in external gstate respectively.
• Support for PDF 2.0 file version - PDF Library can now read and edit files with PDF 2.0 version. Two new APIs
PDDocGetAdobePDFVersion and PDDocSetAdobePDFVersion have been introduced in this release for getting
and setting new PDF version respectively.
• Support of Black point compensation (BPC) flag - UseBlackPtComp has been added to the graphic state
parameter dictionary. Two new APIs PDEExtGStateGetBPC and PDEExtGStateSetBPC have been added to get
and set UseBlackPtComp flag value respectively.
• Support for Page-Level Output Intent - User can set Output Intent for each Page as well. Two new APIs
PDDocColorConvertEmbedOutputIntentEx and PDPageColorConvertEmbedOutputIntent have been added to
support new output intent subtypes added in PDF 2.0. Appropriate subtype like GTS_PDFX, GTS_PDFA, and
ISO_PDFE1 can be added to the output profile as per the value passed to these APIs.
• If output intent already exists at Doc/Page level, then new output intent gets added to the existing one.
• PDColorConvertPDEElementEx2 API has been added to support conversion to a PDEElement to the supplied
color space.
• PDSysEncodingSetIsUTF16 API has been added to check if an encoding is UTF-16 or not.
• In PDF 2.0, versioning model has been changed and now support 2-part version system which is a
combination of Major and Minor version like Major.Minor as compared to 3-part version system
Major.Minor.ExtensionLevel in PDF 1.7.
• Two new APIs PDEFormGetLeading and PDEFormSetLeading have been added to get and set respectively the
Leading in parent of Form.
• A new parameter weight of type unsigned integer is added in PDEFontAttrs structure.
• Updated Decryption Sample to showcase the support for Unicode based password protected PDFs.
• Updated CMaps and mapping resources to support Adobe-Japan1-7 fonts.
• Full Compatibility with Acrobat DC.
• The current release includes the following changes to supported platforms. In version 18.0 and later:
o Windows 10 is the primary operating system for Windows platforms.
o The supported compiler for all Windows platforms is Visual Studio 2017(version 15.3.3).
o Mac OS X 10.12 (Sierra) is supported on 64-bit platforms.
o The supported operating system for Linux platforms is CentOS 7.3, with the Clang 3.9.1 compiler. The
glibc version to be used is 2.17.
o The supported compiler for all Macintosh platforms is Xcode Developer Tools 8.2.1.
o Support for the following platforms has been discontinued:
 Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 on 32-bit platforms.
 Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7 on 64-bit platforms.
 Mac OS X 10.9 (Mavericks) on 64-bit platforms.

Is the Adobe PDF Library freely available?

No. It is licensed to independent software vendors (ISVs), original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), systems
integrators, and enterprise IT customers and partners. Pricing is based on a royalty model. For enterprise
applications for internal use, pricing is based on the deployment configuration.

How do I get the Adobe PDF Library?

The Adobe PDF Library is available from Tech Soft 3D (www.techsoft3d.com) for CAD customers; EAST (www.
est.co.jp) in Japan; or Datalogics, Inc. (www.datalogics.com) in North America, Europe, and the rest of the world.

Can I download a trial version of the Adobe PDF Library?

No. At present, no trial version is available for download. However, we would like to encourage interested
developers to enter the Adobe PDF Library evaluation program. Evaluation copies of the Adobe PDF Library
are provided under a specific evaluation agreement as part of the licensing process.

Can I use the Adobe PDF Library with server-based applications?

Yes. The Adobe PDF Library is an ideal solution for integrating PDF capabilities with server applications. Using
the Adobe PDF Library, your applications can dynamically generate, access, manipulate, and print Adobe PDF
documents in server environments. An application developed using the Adobe PDF Library can run without
Acrobat or any other Adobe products.

I have developed a plug-in for Acrobat DC. Can I use it in a server environment?
You must have Acrobat DC running in order to run the plug-in. Generally speaking, Acrobat cannot be used
 ona server. Please refer to the Acrobat DC End-User License Agreement to review license restrictions on using
Acrobat DC in a server environment.

Can I use my Acrobat and/or Reader plug-in with PDF Library?

No. The PDF Library SDK does not support Acrobat or Reader plug-ins.

Can I use the Adobe PDF Library in a multi-threaded environment?

Yes. Applications can safely use the Adobe PDF Library in multi-threaded environments. The library also
has excellent memory management capabilities and an in-memory file system for high-volume PDF
processing applications.

What platforms are supported by the Adobe PDF Library SDK?

The Adobe PDF Library SDK is available on a wide range of platforms, Microsoft® Windows® (32 bit and 64 bit),
Mac OS (64 bit), Linux® (64 bit).

Can I use the Adobe PDF Library to convert Microsoft Office documents, such as Word and Excel, to
Adobe PDF?
The Adobe PDF Library does not offer the ability to convert Office documents to Adobe PDF. You need to use
Acrobat DC software.

Can I use the Adobe PDF Library to generate Adobe PDF output from my application?
If you have layout and source data for output pages, you can output Adobe PDF files using the Adobe PDF
Library by creating the PDF objects directly.

How much does the Adobe PDF Library cost?

Pricing is royalty based and dependent on the Adobe PDF Library functionality used by your application. For
enterprise IT customers, pricing is based on the deployment configuration.

Is developer support available? If so, what does it cost?

Yes. The Adobe PDF Library is fully supported by Adobe, with dedicated support teams. Support and
maintenance fees are paid at the same time as your licensing fees. In addition, Adobe ships new maintenance
releases on a regular basis and provides major feature releases synchronized with major Acrobat releases
and revisions of the Adobe PDF specification. As with license fees, support fees are based on the number of
platforms/servers licensed.

What documentation is available for the Adobe PDF Library?

Adobe provides extensive documentation for licensed Adobe PDF Library users, including an Adobe PDF
Library Overview, PDF Library API Reference, and PDF Reference for PDF version 1.7. These and other documents
can be found in PDFL SDK XVIII HTML help.

What fonts can I embed using the Adobe PDF Library?

The Adobe PDF Library provides full support for embedding and subsetting TrueType, Type 1, and OpenType®
fonts. Single-byte, double-byte, and Unicode font support allows third-party applications to be localized in a
broad range of languages, including Arabic, Chinese, Cyrillic, Hebrew, Japanese, and Korean.

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