CHAPTER 1

1 Introduction

The Adobe Portable Document Format (PDF) is the native file format of the
Adobe® Acrobat® family of products. The goal of these products is to enable users
to exchange and view electronic documents easily and reliably, independently of
the environment in which they were created. PDF relies on the same imaging
model as the PostScript® page description language to describe text and graphics
in a device-independent and resolution-independent manner. To improve perfor-
mance for interactive viewing, PDF defines a more structured format than that
used by most PostScript language programs. PDF also includes objects, such as
annotations and hypertext links, that are not part of the page itself but are useful
for interactive viewing and document interchange.

1.1 About This Book

This book provides a description of the PDF file format and is intended primarily
for developers of PDF producer applications that create PDF files directly. It also
contains enough information to allow developers to write PDF consumer applica-
tions that read existing PDF files and interpret or modify their contents.

Although the PDF Reference is independent of any particular software implemen-

tation, some PDF features are best explained by describing the way they are pro-
cessed by a typical application program. In such cases, this book uses the Acrobat
family of PDF viewer applications as its model. (The prototypical viewer is the
fully capable Acrobat product, not the limited Adobe Reader® product.) Appendix
C discusses some implementation limits in the Acrobat viewer applications, even
though these limits are not part of the file format itself. Appendix H provides
compatibility and implementation notes that describe how Acrobat viewers be-
have when they encounter newer features they do not understand and specify ar-
eas in which the Acrobat products diverge from the specification presented in

25
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CHAPTER 1 Introduction

this book. Implementors of PDF producer and consumer applications can use
this information as guidance.

This edition of the PDF Reference describes version 1.7 of PDF. (See implementa-
tion note 1 in Appendix H.) Throughout the book, information specific to partic-
ular versions of PDF is marked with indicators such as (PDF 1.3) or (PDF 1.4).
Features so marked may be new or substantially redefined in that version. Fea-
tures designated (PDF 1.0) have generally been superseded in later versions; un-
less otherwise stated, features identified as specific to other versions are
understood to be available in later versions as well. (PDF consumer applications
designed for a specific PDF version generally ignore newer features they do not
recognize; implementation notes in Appendix H point out exceptions.)

Note: In this edition, the term consumer is generally used to refer to PDF processing
applications; viewer is reserved for applications that implement features that inter-
act with users. This distinction is not always clear, however, since non-interactive
applications may process objects in PDF documents (such as annotations) that rep-
resent interactive features.

The rest of the book is organized as follows:

• Chapter 2, “Overview,” briefly introduces the overall architecture of PDF and

the design considerations behind it, compares it with the PostScript language,
and describes the underlying imaging model that they share.
• Chapter 3, “Syntax,” presents the syntax of PDF at the object, file, and docu-
ment level. It sets the stage for subsequent chapters, which describe how that
information is interpreted as page descriptions, interactive navigational aids,
and application-level logical structure.
• Chapter 4, “Graphics,” describes the graphics operators used to describe the
appearance of pages in a PDF document.
• Chapter 5, “Text,” discusses PDF’s special facilities for presenting text in the
form of character shapes, or glyphs, defined by fonts.
• Chapter 6, “Rendering,” considers how device-independent content descrip-
tions are matched to the characteristics of a particular output device.
• Chapter 7, “Transparency,” discusses the operation of the transparent imaging
model, introduced in PDF 1.4, in which objects can be painted with varying
degrees of opacity, allowing the previous contents of the page to show through.
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SECTION 1.1 About This Book

• Chapter 8, “Interactive Features,” describes those features of PDF that allow a

user to interact with a document on the screen by using the mouse and key-
board.
• Chapter 9, “Multimedia Features,” describes those features of PDF that support
embedding and playing multimedia content, including video, music and 3D
artwork.
• Chapter 10, “Document Interchange,” shows how PDF documents can incor-
porate higher-level information that is useful for the interchange of documents
among applications.
• Appendix A, “Operator Summary,” lists all the operators used in describing the
visual content of a PDF document.
• Appendix B, “Operators in Type 4 Functions,” summarizes the PostScript oper-
ators that can be used in PostScript calculator functions, which contain code
written in a small subset of the PostScript language.
• Appendix C, “Implementation Limits,” describes typical size and quantity
limits imposed by the Acrobat viewer applications.
• Appendix D, “Character Sets and Encodings,” lists the character sets and en-
codings that are assumed to be predefined in any PDF consumer application.
• Appendix E, “PDF Name Registry,” discusses a registry, maintained for devel-
opers by Adobe Systems, that contains private names and formats used by PDF
producers or Acrobat plug-in extensions.
• Appendix F, “Linearized PDF,” describes a special form of PDF file organiza-
tion designed to work efficiently in network environments.
• Appendix G, “Example PDF Files,” presents several examples showing the
structure of actual PDF files, ranging from one containing a minimal one-page
document to one showing how the structure of a PDF file evolves over the
course of several revisions.
• Appendix H, “Compatibility and Implementation Notes,” provides details on
the behavior of Acrobat viewer applications and describes how consumer appli-
cations should handle PDF files containing features that they do not recognize.
• Appendix I, “Computation of Object Digests,” describes in detail an algorithm
for calculating an object digest (discussed in Section 8.7, “Digital Signatures”).
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CHAPTER 1 Introduction

A color plate section provides illustrations of some of PDF’s color-related fea-

tures. References in the text of the form “see Plate 1” refer to the contents of this
section.

The book concludes with a Bibliography and an Index.

1.2 Introduction to PDF 1.7 Features

Several features have been introduced or modified in PDF 1.7. The following is a
list of the most significant additions, along with references to the primary sec-
tions where those additions are discussed:

1.2.1 Presentation of 3D Artwork

PDF 1.7 introduces new features that increase the control the PDF viewing appli-
cation has over the appearance and behavior of 3D artwork:
• More control over the appearance of 3D artwork, without having to change the
original artwork and without the use of embedded JavaScript. Specific views of
3D artwork can specify how that artwork should be rendered, colored, lit, and
cross-sectioned. They can also specify which nodes (three-dimensional areas)
of 3D artwork should be included in a view, where those nodes should be
placed in the view, and whether they should be transparent. These features can
expose areas of geometry that would otherwise be difficult to view.
• The ability to place markup annotations on specific views of 3D artwork. This
ensures that markups applied to 3D artwork can later be shown properly with
respect to both the artwork as a whole and individual elements within the art-
work. Markup annotations applied to 3D artwork provide a means of ensuring
the artwork has not changed since the markup annotation was applied.
• Control over the user interfaces and toolbars presented on activation of 3D art-
work.
• Control over the timeframe, repetition, and style of play of keyframe anima-
tions. The styles of play are linear repetition (as in a walking character) and a
cosine-based repetition (as in an exploding-contracting image).
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SECTION 1.2 Introduction to PDF 1.7 Features

1.2.2 Interactive Features

Several additions to markup annotations make them more suitable for technical
communication and review, or for use in a legal setting.

Interactive Features That Aid Technical Communication

Several additions to markup annotations aid technical communication and review:

• The addition of dimension intents for polyline and polygon markup annota-
tions. Dimension intent supports the association of user-provided dimension
information with the line segments that compose polyline and polygon markup
annotations. This feature is similar to the dimension intent introduced for line
markup annotations in PDF 1.6.
• The ability to specify units and scaling for the dimension intents of line,
polyline, and polygon markup annotations. This feature enables users to mea-
sure distances in the document, such as the width of an architectural diagram
or the diameter of a 3D cross section.
• The ability to place markup annotations on specific views of 3D artwork
• The ability to lock the contents of an annotation

Interactive Feature for Use in a Legal Setting

One addition to markup annotations is intended for use in a legal setting, espe-
cially banking. The addition of new viewer preference settings that specify print
characteristics, such as paper selection and handling, page range, copies, and
scaling. When a user prints a PDF document with those viewer preference set-
tings, the print dialog is pre-populated as specified in those settings. This capabil-
ity increases the predictability of how PDF documents are printed, which can
make PDF documents more suitable for use in a legal setting.

1.2.3 Accessibility Related Features

Additions to TaggedPDF identify the roles of more types of page content:

• The ability to identify the roles of form fields in non-interactive PDF docu-
ments. This change identifies button fields (pushbuttons, check boxes and ra-
dio buttons) and text fields (populated or unpopulated).
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CHAPTER 1 Introduction

• The ability to provide table summaries associated with table structures. This
feature can help a visually impaired person understand the purpose and struc-
ture of a table without having to read the content in that table.
• The ability to identify background page artifacts, which can be important to
document reflowing. Background artifacts are collections of objects that do not
contribute to the meaning of the author's original content, such as a colored
rectangle behind a sidebar or a full-page background image. Such page back-
grounds may not correlate to any logical structure, but they may be useful in
reproducing the appearance of original document.
• The ability to differentiate the pagination artifacts: watermarks, headers and
footers.

1.2.4 Document Navigation Feature

Additions to document navigation specify the viewing and organizational charac-

teristics of portable collections, in which multiple file attachments are displayed
within a single window. Portable collections are used to present, sort, and search
collections of related documents, such as email archives, photo collections, and
engineering bid sets.

1.2.5 Security-Related Features

Additions to PDF introduced in 1.7 increase the control the document author can
impose upon digital signatures and over requirements PDF consumer applica-
tions must satisfy:
• Additional digital signature constraints, which are enforced at the time the sig-
nature is applied. These constraints include preferred digest methods, revoca-
tion checking of the certificate used in a signature, and flags that clarify the
interpretation of other parameters.
• Additional constraints regarding the certificate to be used when signing. These
constraints include Subject Distinguished Name (DN) dictionaries that must
be present in the certificate, KeyUsage extensions that must be present in the
signing certificate, and flags that clarify the interpretation of other parameters
that specify certificate constraints.
• The ability to specify requirement handlers that verify some requirement that
the PDF consumer applications must satisfy before processing or displaying a
PDF document. This feature provides an approach that ensures backward com-
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SECTION 1.3 Related Publications

patibility with PDF documents that may include JavaScript segments to verify a
requirement. Before this feature was added, JavaScript was the only way to per-
form such requirement-checking. The feature ensures that either the JavaScript
segment verifies the requirement or a named handler verifies the requirement.

1.2.6 General Features

Additions to PDF 1.7 provide more cross-platform and cross-application stability,

by providing encoding information for strings and file names:
• The clarification of string types to describe the encodings used for strings.
Throughout the entire PDF Reference, any uses of the string type are replaced
with one of the more specific string types. This clarification does not require
changes to PDF consumer applications. Instead, it provides a clearer under-
standing of the encoding supported by each PDF string entry. This understand-
ing can be especially important when comparing strings in a PDF document to
strings in an external source, such as an XML document or 3D artwork.
• The ability to specify file names using Unicode in addition to specifying file
names using the standard encoding for the platform on which the document is
being viewed. This feature reduces problems in decoding file path names that
have been encoded on a different platform or in a different language.

1.2.7 PDF Reference Changes

This release of the PDF Reference includes clarifications not related to new fea-
tures or additional capabilities:
• A description of the formulas for all blend modes.
• An explanation of the TaggedPDF representation of nested table of contents
entries or list entries.

1.3 Related Publications

PDF and the PostScript page description language share the same underlying
Adobe imaging model. A document can be converted straightforwardly between
PDF and the PostScript language; the two representations produce the same out-
put when printed. However, PostScript includes a general-purpose programming
language framework not present in PDF. The PostScript Language Reference is the
comprehensive reference for the PostScript language and its imaging model.
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CHAPTER 1 Introduction

PDF and PostScript support several standard formats for font programs, includ-
ing Adobe Type 1, CFF (Compact Font Format), TrueType, OpenType and CID-
keyed fonts. The PDF manifestations of these fonts are documented in this book.
However, the specifications for the font files themselves are published separately,
because they are highly specialized and are of interest to a different user commu-
nity. A variety of Adobe publications are available on the subject of font formats.
The Bibliography lists these publications, as well as additional documents related
to PDF and the contents of this book.

1.4 Intellectual Property

Adobe owns copyrights in the PDF Reference. Adobe will enforce its copyrights.
One reason Adobe must retain its copyrights in the PDF Reference is to maintain
the integrity of the Portable Document Format standard and ensure that the pub-
lic can distinguish between the Portable Document Format and other interchange
formats for electronic documents. Nonetheless, Adobe desires to promote the use
of the Portable Document Format for information interchange among diverse
products and applications. Accordingly, Adobe gives permission to everyone un-
der its copyrights to copy, modify, and distribute any example code in the written
specification, to the extent necessary to implement the Portable Document For-
mat in a manner compliant with the PDF Reference.1

Adobe Systems Incorporated and its subsidiaries own a number of patents cover-
ing technology disclosed in the PDF Reference. Nothing in the PDF Reference it-
self grants rights under any patent. Nonetheless, Adobe desires to encourage
implementation of the PDF computer file format on a wide variety of devices and
platforms, and for this reason offers certain royalty-free patent licenses to PDF
implementors worldwide. To review those licenses, please visit
http://www.adobe.com/go/developer_legalnotices.

1.This example code includes, but is not limited to, the copyrighted list of data structures, opera-
tors, and PostScript language function definitions, that were referenced in PDF Reference, fifth
edition, version 1.6, Section 1.5 (Intellectual Property).