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Posted to fop-dev@xmlgraphics.apache.org by Glen Mazza <gr...@yahoo.com> on 2004/10/09 03:28:29 UTC
Valid version of the PDF specification?
Team,
Which version [1] of the PDF spec does FOP follow?
Can HEAD use the most recent, version 1.5 from August
2003?
Thanks,
Glen
[1] http://partners.adobe.com/asn/tech/pdf/specifications.jsp
Re: Valid version of the PDF specification?
Posted by Chris Bowditch <bo...@hotmail.com>.
Glen Mazza wrote:
> OK -- PDF 1.4 it is. I agree with supporting Acrobat
> V5. However, I don't see backwards compatibility
> concerns as much of an issue here, given the Acrobat
> Reader is free and pretty easy to download.
Glen,
you are right that AR is free and easily available. However, large
organisations have a tendency to lock down users PC's to prevent downloading
for security reasons and object to rolling out new versions of software to
10000 PC's for obvious reasons.
Chris
Re: Valid version of the PDF specification?
Posted by Clay Leeds <cl...@medata.com>.
On Oct 11, 2004, at 9:58 AM, Glen Mazza wrote:
> Clay,
>
> It's not just the *quantity* of consumers, it is also
> their level of happiness, as well as our ability to
> recruit developers willing to do the coding. (Absent
> committers willing to spend the time on the code, *no*
> version of PDF will get supported.) Per your
> suggestion, though, if we were to drop the FOP's PDF
> specification-level to pre-2000 versions, these
> problems occur:
>
> 1.) The 98% that would have no problem with the 2001 spec will note
> that our product doesn't render as well
> as the commercial products do. Features they would want to implement
> aren't possible. So the benefit of
> making the 2% AR4.0 user base happy comes at a price of making unhappy
> the other 98%, and due the ratios
> involved, overall satisfaction with the FOP product would fall through
> the floor.
As I mentioned, Glen, my purpose in questioning the move to PDF 1.4 as
a base (if it is a move?) is to indicate we should only make such
changes if there is a distinct need for it. I don't know how many users
there are out there, and certainly I have no intention to make 98% of
our users unhappy. If that were the case (and I'm not convinced that is
the case) then I would be holding the "Let's move to PDF 1.4" flag.
> 2.) It is next to impossible to recruit people to study the PDF
> specification inside and out in order to implement a PDF
> renderer--there are no shortage of other much-more-in-use skills that
> take far less time to learn. That problem is compounded when you as
> them (1) to not only study the PDF spec, but a commercially obsolete
> 6-year old version of it, and (2) to spend their time doing so with
> the full knowledge of when they're finished, everyone is going to be
> panning their work (see #1 above). Few developers can afford to do
> what you are proposing.
>
> 3.) Generally speaking, virtually no one is stuck at AR4.0, and those
> who are aren't writing FO documents. You may make that calculation
> that it is acceptable for 500,000 users to have a substandard product
> just so the feelings of 10 AR4.0 users don't get hurt, but I don't
> think you'll get much support for that on the team.
Folks stuck at AR 4.0 (or less!) may not be writing FO documents, but
they may be required to view FOP PDF output.
> 4.) By having a substandard PDF renderer, you lose more V5/V6 people
> than you gain of V4 people, so overall application usage drops rather
> than increases. Without exception the V5/V6 people are the ones you
> would want to please anyway--they're the ones writing the reviews,
> they're the ones more likely to be using it for production
> applications. (Someone from IBM or Sun isn't going to write a review
> of "Using FOP with AR4.0"; instead they will write about "FOP with
> AR6.0", and in particular how poorly it performs and how out-of-date
> it is.)
I'm not talking about requiring all FOP output be 'stuck' at PDF 1.3.
I'm just saying that if we can output to PDF 1.3, great! If we add
something that requires PDF 1.4, or PDF 1.5 that's great too!
> Glen (Who thinks AR V4 will work with the 1.4 spec anyway ;)
That may be the case (That'd be great!), and would mean our output is
available to those folks who can't install Adobe/Reader 5.x or 6.x or
+...
My desire is simply for the reasoning and discussion for any
significant change (minimum output: PDF 1.3 vs. 1.4, minimum FOP
requirements: JDK 1.3 vs. 1.4 vs. 1.5, etc.) to be available in the
archives. If there's a good reason for it, by all means, make the
change!
Web Maestro Clay
--
Clay Leeds - <cl...@medata.com>
Webmaster/Developer - Medata, Inc. - <http://www.medata.com/>
PGP Public Key: <https://mail.medata.com/pgp/cleeds.asc>
Re: Valid version of the PDF specification?
Posted by Glen Mazza <gr...@yahoo.com>.
Clay,
It's not just the *quantity* of consumers, it is also
their level of happiness, as well as our ability to
recruit developers willing to do the coding. (Absent
committers willing to spend the time on the code, *no*
version of PDF will get supported.) Per your
suggestion, though, if we were to drop the FOP's PDF
specification-level to pre-2000 versions, these
problems occur:
1.) The 98% that would have no problem with the 2001
spec will note that our product doesn't render as well
as the commercial products do. Features they would
want to implement aren't possible. So the benefit of
making the 2% AR4.0 user base happy comes at a price
of making unhappy the other 98%, and due the ratios
involved, overall satisfaction with the FOP product
would fall through the floor.
2.) It is next to impossible to recruit people to
study the PDF specification inside and out in order to
implement a PDF renderer--there are no shortage of
other much-more-in-use skills that take far less time
to learn. That problem is compounded when you ask
them (1) to not only study the PDF spec, but a
commercially obsolete 6-year old version of it, and
(2) to spend their time doing so with the full
knowledge of when they're finished, everyone is going
to be panning their work (see #1 above). Few
developers can afford to do what you are proposing.
3.) Generally speaking, virtually no one is stuck at
AR4.0, and those who are aren't writing FO documents.
You may make that calculation that it is acceptable
for 500,000 users to have a substandard product just
so the feelings of 10 AR4.0 users don't get hurt, but
I don't think you'll get much support for that on the
team.
4.) By having a substandard PDF renderer, you lose
more V5/V6 people than you gain of V4 people, so
overall application usage drops rather than increases.
Without exception the V5/V6 people are the ones you
would want to please anyway--they're the ones writing
the reviews, they're the ones more likely to be using
it for production applications. (Someone from IBM or
Sun isn't going to write a review of "Using FOP with
AR4.0"; instead they will write about "FOP with
AR6.0", and in particular how poorly it performs and
how out-of-date it is.)
Glen (Who thinks AR V4 will work with the 1.4 spec
anyway ;)
--- Clay Leeds <cl...@medata.com> wrote:
> On Oct 11, 2004, at 7:06 AM, Glen Mazza wrote:
> > 1.4 (Copyright 2001) is fine for us.
>
> That's OK by me, as long as that is the consensus
> and not the opinion
> of one of our esteemed committers. I was hoping for
> a little discussion
> about why PDF 1.3 is not even an option? There is
> some discussion of
> this topic in the archives[1] & [2] and also in the
> FOPProjectTasks
> wiki[3]. I acknowledge certain items require PDF 1.4
> (transparency,
> encryption, and others[4]). But like Jeremias said
> in this thread[2]:
>
Re: Valid version of the PDF specification?
Posted by Clay Leeds <cl...@medata.com>.
On Oct 11, 2004, at 7:06 AM, Glen Mazza wrote:
> 1.4 (Copyright 2001) is fine for us.
That's OK by me, as long as that is the consensus and not the opinion
of one of our esteemed committers. I was hoping for a little discussion
about why PDF 1.3 is not even an option? There is some discussion of
this topic in the archives[1] & [2] and also in the FOPProjectTasks
wiki[3]. I acknowledge certain items require PDF 1.4 (transparency,
encryption, and others[4]). But like Jeremias said in this thread[2]:
> On 06.08.2002 09:23:06 Keiron Liddle wrote:
> > On Tue, 2002-08-06 at 09:00, Kevin O'Neill wrote:
> > > > Processor that complies with the XSL:FO spec to create PDF. [1]
> > >
> > > 1.3 or 1.4?
> >
> > 1.4
> > because we have transparency
>
> If that's the only reason, I'd like to have this configurable. I'd
> regret losing 1.3 compatibility.
My preference is still to 'shoot' for PDF 1.3 for all output which
doesn't require PDF 1.4+ features. If one of those features is applied,
then the format should change.
Then again, judging by my output, fop-0.20.5 appears to generate PDF
1.3 files (unless Encryption is enabled). Please correct me if I'm
wrong. Requiring anyone who needs PDF 1.3 output would be perfectly
acceptable to me, although for this and other reasons (bug fixes, added
support for Barcode4J[5], & other PATCHes) I'd like to see a 0.20.6
release off of the maintenance branch (which could occur after our
FOP-1.0 release).
[1]
http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=fop-dev&m=104246257322783&w=2
[2]
http://marc.theaimsgroup.com/?l=fop-dev&m=102861860310316&w=2#1
[3]
http://nagoya.apache.org/wiki/apachewiki.cgi?FOPProjectTasks
[4]
http://partners.adobe.com/asn/acrobat/docs/File_Format_Specifications/
PDF14Deltas.pdf
[5]
http://barcode4j.sourceforge.net/fop-
ext.html#The+special+FOP+extension+%28for+experienced+developers+only%29
Web Maestro Clay
--
Clay Leeds - <cl...@medata.com>
Webmaster/Developer - Medata, Inc. - <http://www.medata.com/>
PGP Public Key: <https://mail.medata.com/pgp/cleeds.asc>
Re: Valid version of the PDF specification?
Posted by Glen Mazza <gr...@yahoo.com>.
1.4 (Copyright 2001) is fine for us.
--- Clay Leeds <cl...@medata.com> wrote:
> My preference is similar to Jeremias' preference. I
> prefer we move to a
> higher requirement(s) when there are clear and
> expressed needs for such
> moves. In fact, I would prefer we support 1.3 by
> default, and only
> require 1.4 or 1.5 for those items and features
> which require it. I
> admit, my knowledge of the spec is incomplete at
> best, but I'd like to
> see FOP work toward greater inclusion, moving toward
> wider support
> rather than narrowing our list of prospective
> consumers.
>
> On a similar note, I think changes to FOP minimum
> requirements for
> output (and minimum requirements for running FOP)
> should be the result
> of an established need.
>
> On Oct 9, 2004, at 5:46 AM, Glen Mazza wrote:
> > OK -- PDF 1.4 it is. I agree with supporting
> Acrobat
> > V5. However, I don't see backwards compatibility
> > concerns as much of an issue here, given the
> Acrobat
> > Reader is free and pretty easy to download.
>
> It is free and easy to download, but the issue of
> system requirements
> [2] come into play, especially with regard to Adobe
> Reader 6.0.1 (see
> [2] for more on 6.x requirements). Since PDF 1.4
> probably requires
> Adobe Acrobat Reader 5.x. I thought I'd post its
> requirements here:
>
> Acrobat Reader 5.0 system requirements
> (in addition to 24MB-60MB of Hard Disk)
> ================================
> Windows
>
>
> ATTACHMENT part 2 image/gif x-unix-mode=0666;
name=blkbullet.gif
> Microsoft Windows 95 OSR 2.0 or better
>
> ATTACHMENT part 4 image/gif x-unix-mode=0666;
name=blkbullet.gif
> 64MB of RAM
>
> Macintosh
>
> ATTACHMENT part 6 image/gif x-unix-mode=0666;
name=blkbullet.gif
> Mac OS 8.6*, 9.0.4, 9.1, or Mac OS X*
>
> ATTACHMENT part 8 image/gif x-unix-mode=0666;
name=blkbullet.gif
> 64MB of RAM
>
> ATTACHMENT part 10 image/gif x-unix-mode=0666;
name=blkbullet.gif
> * Some features may not be available.
>
> IBM AIX
>
> ATTACHMENT part 12 image/gif x-unix-mode=0666;
name=blkbullet.gif
> IBM AIX 4.3.3, 5.1
>
> ATTACHMENT part 14 image/gif x-unix-mode=0666;
name=blkbullet.gif
> 64MB of available RAM (128MB recommended)
>
> HP-UX
>
> ATTACHMENT part 16 image/gif x-unix-mode=0666;
name=blkbullet.gif
> HP-UX 10.2, 11.0
>
> ATTACHMENT part 18 image/gif x-unix-mode=0666;
name=blkbullet.gif
> 64MB of available RAM (128MB recommended)
>
> Linux
>
> ATTACHMENT part 20 image/gif x-unix-mode=0666;
name=blkbullet.gif
> Linux 2.2 kernel on X86 computer
>
> ATTACHMENT part 22 image/gif x-unix-mode=0666;
name=blkbullet.gif
> 64MB of available RAM
>
> Sun Solaris - SPARC�
>
> ATTACHMENT part 24 image/gif x-unix-mode=0666;
name=blkbullet.gif
> Sun Solaris 2.6, 7, and 8 supported on SPARC and
> UltraSPARC� computers
>
> ATTACHMENT part 26 image/gif x-unix-mode=0666;
name=blkbullet.gif
> 64MB of available RAM
>
> After seeing the broad spectrum of support,
> requiring Acrobat 5.x is
> probably fine, but it would be nice to have a
> fall-back for supporting
> pre 5.x (PDF 1.3). If it just means not supporting
> URLs or bookmarks or
> something--especially if it doesn't add too much to
> the development--it
> may be a small price to pay for the benefit.
>
> Web Maestro Clay
>
> > Thanks,
> > Glen
> >
> > --- Jeremias Maerki <de...@greenmail.ch>
> wrote:
> >> Do you have a particular reason for this? A
> feature that you need from
> >> 1.5? Most of the people I know who are users of
> Adobe Acrobat are
> >> still
> >> with version 5 which uses PDF 1.4. Only a small
> number of people have
> >> upgraded their Acrobat Reader to version 6. Start
> time of AR6 is a
> >> PITA
> >> so I personally love to stick with v5 as long as
> possible.
> >>
> >> One problem I see is that as soon as you state
> PDF 1.5 in your PDF
> >> file
> >> you will get warnings in Acrobat versions 5.x.
> That might annoy some
> >> people. I understand that PDF 1.3 is now
> outdated, but I'd prefer to
> >> stay with PDF 1.4 for the time being.
> >>
> >> On 09.10.2004 03:28:29 Glen Mazza wrote:
> >>> Team,
> >>>
> >>> Which version [1] of the PDF spec does FOP
> follow?
> >>
> >>> Can HEAD use the most recent, version 1.5 from
> August
> >>> 2003?
> >>>
> >>> Thanks,
> >>> Glen
> >>>
> >>> [1]
> >>
> >
>
http://partners.adobe.com/asn/tech/pdf/specifications.jsp
> >>
> >> Jeremias Maerki
>
> [2]
>
http://www.adobe.com/products/acrobat/acrrsystemreqs.html
>
> Web Maestro Clay
> --
> Clay Leeds - <cl...@medata.com>
> Webmaster/Developer - Medata, Inc. -
> <http://www.medata.com/>
> PGP Public Key:
> <https://mail.medata.com/pgp/cleeds.asc>
>
>
Re: Valid version of the PDF specification?
Posted by Clay Leeds <cl...@medata.com>.
My preference is similar to Jeremias' preference. I prefer we move to a
higher requirement(s) when there are clear and expressed needs for such
moves. In fact, I would prefer we support 1.3 by default, and only
require 1.4 or 1.5 for those items and features which require it. I
admit, my knowledge of the spec is incomplete at best, but I'd like to
see FOP work toward greater inclusion, moving toward wider support
rather than narrowing our list of prospective consumers.
On a similar note, I think changes to FOP minimum requirements for
output (and minimum requirements for running FOP) should be the result
of an established need.
On Oct 9, 2004, at 5:46 AM, Glen Mazza wrote:
> OK -- PDF 1.4 it is. I agree with supporting Acrobat
> V5. However, I don't see backwards compatibility
> concerns as much of an issue here, given the Acrobat
> Reader is free and pretty easy to download.
It is free and easy to download, but the issue of system requirements
[2] come into play, especially with regard to Adobe Reader 6.0.1 (see
[2] for more on 6.x requirements). Since PDF 1.4 probably requires
Adobe Acrobat Reader 5.x. I thought I'd post its requirements here:
Acrobat Reader 5.0 system requirements
(in addition to 24MB-60MB of Hard Disk)
================================
Windows
Re: Valid version of the PDF specification?
Posted by Glen Mazza <gr...@yahoo.com>.
OK -- PDF 1.4 it is. I agree with supporting Acrobat
V5. However, I don't see backwards compatibility
concerns as much of an issue here, given the Acrobat
Reader is free and pretty easy to download.
Thanks,
Glen
--- Jeremias Maerki <de...@greenmail.ch> wrote:
> Do you have a particular reason for this? A feature
> that you need from
> 1.5? Most of the people I know who are users of
> Adobe Acrobat are still
> with version 5 which uses PDF 1.4. Only a small
> number of people have
> upgraded their Acrobat Reader to version 6. Start
> time of AR6 is a PITA
> so I personally love to stick with v5 as long as
> possible.
>
> One problem I see is that as soon as you state PDF
> 1.5 in your PDF file
> you will get warnings in Acrobat versions 5.x. That
> might annoy some
> people. I understand that PDF 1.3 is now outdated,
> but I'd prefer to
> stay with PDF 1.4 for the time being.
>
> On 09.10.2004 03:28:29 Glen Mazza wrote:
> > Team,
> >
> > Which version [1] of the PDF spec does FOP follow?
>
> > Can HEAD use the most recent, version 1.5 from
> August
> > 2003?
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Glen
> >
> > [1]
>
http://partners.adobe.com/asn/tech/pdf/specifications.jsp
>
>
>
> Jeremias Maerki
>
>
Re: Valid version of the PDF specification?
Posted by Jeremias Maerki <de...@greenmail.ch>.
Do you have a particular reason for this? A feature that you need from
1.5? Most of the people I know who are users of Adobe Acrobat are still
with version 5 which uses PDF 1.4. Only a small number of people have
upgraded their Acrobat Reader to version 6. Start time of AR6 is a PITA
so I personally love to stick with v5 as long as possible.
One problem I see is that as soon as you state PDF 1.5 in your PDF file
you will get warnings in Acrobat versions 5.x. That might annoy some
people. I understand that PDF 1.3 is now outdated, but I'd prefer to
stay with PDF 1.4 for the time being.
On 09.10.2004 03:28:29 Glen Mazza wrote:
> Team,
>
> Which version [1] of the PDF spec does FOP follow?
> Can HEAD use the most recent, version 1.5 from August
> 2003?
>
> Thanks,
> Glen
>
> [1] http://partners.adobe.com/asn/tech/pdf/specifications.jsp
Jeremias Maerki