The Portable Document Format (PDF), undeniably one of the most commonly used formats for electronic documents, is now accessible as an ISO International Standard - ISO 32000-1. This move follows a decision by Adobe Systems Incorporated, original developer and copyright owner of the format, to relinquish control to ISO, who is now in charge of publishing the specifications for the current version (1.7) and for updating and developing future versions.
“By releasing the full PDF specification for ISO standardization, we are reinforcing our commitment to openness,” says Kevin Lynch, Chief Technology Officer at Adobe. “As governments and organizations increasingly request open formats, maintenance of the PDF specification by an external and participatory organization will help continue to drive innovation and expand the rich PDF ecosystem that has evolved over the past 15 years.”
PDF, a digital form used to represent electronic documents, allows users to exchange and view the documents easily and reliably, independent of the environments in which they are created, viewed and printed, while preserving their content and visual appearance.
With the explosive growth of the Internet, PDF has become one of the most common formats for document exchange, widely used in all professional and personal contexts. The format enables:
- preservation of document fidelity independent of device or platform
- merging of content from diverse sources
- collaborative editing of documents using multiple platforms
- digital signatures for authenticity
- security and permissions to preserve control over content
- accessibility of content to those with disabilities
- extraction and reuse of content for use with other file formats, and
- gathering data and integrating it with business systems using PDF forms.
Read the rest at ISO
Posted by FA Editors at 4:00 PM PDT
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Zimbabwe Horror
New York Times - “The youth,” as foot soldiers of Zimbabwe’s ruling party are often called, broke the legs of an 11-month-old baby when they were looking for his father, an opposition organizer.
Mandela speaks on Mugabe failure - BBC News
Posted by FA Editors at 8:19 PM PDT
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When I first heard about the Gloucester, Massachusetts high school girls who made a pact to become pregnant and to raise their children together, I wasn’t surprised by the media reaction to this Time story. Some reporters pulled a knee-jerk response that called for more birth control and sex education. The reaction from other writers is to criticize the previous reactions and to call for more discipline, a stronger sense of responsibility, and no public funds used to support any of the girls. As one article stated bluntly, “They made their ‘choice,’ and they can live with the consequences.”
My initial reaction to the Time story was, “It takes a village.” While a few friends thought my reaction was funny, I didn’t intend it as a joke. In fact, this pact reminded me of my time spent in a little town in Colorado, where I belonged to a group of families that took this philosophy seriously. Kids were dropped off at one family’s house, sometimes for days at a time while their parents went to Denver or off to some remote mountain top. In exchange, the host parents felt free to leave their children with other families to go off for a few days. The kids felt at home in over a dozen residences in that town. And, they knew that love - as well as discipline - was the same across the board. No manipulation allowed!
So, when I read the Time article and the subsequent media fallout, I wondered what prompted these seventeen teens to initiate this pact. Where they trying to build community? Or, was this decision a result of delusional and immature thinking? The teens and their parents decline to be interviewed. Instead, psychologists, school officials and other authority figures feel obligated to express their reasons for the pact. The high school clinic nurse, Kim Daly, stated that, “This is a community that is very much struggling…Some probably see this as something to do…Having a baby gives them an identity.” And, from the same story, Superintendent Christopher Farmer told the Gloucester School Committee that, “This is a community problem.”
But, what is this community like, and what, exactly, is the problem?
Read on, mon cher! »
Posted by Linda at 3:47 AM PDT
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A few months ago, the company I work for released a Google Gadget for iGoogle for creating a simple CD label. But is this cool, Worldlabel.com released a Widget for the Apple Mac on Friday and is now a Dashboard Widgets featured download.
A special thanks to Brad Anderson of goglobalgadget.com/ for developing the widget.
Posted by Russell at 6:37 PM PDT
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