Adobe Systems' popular portable document format, or PDF as it's more well-known, has become the latest International Organization for Standardization (ISO) standard as of Wednesday morning.
Adobe has been the key developer and patent holder of the technology, and on Wednesday passed over the entire specification of version 1.7 to the Geneva-based ISO. This comes just a year and a half after Adobe made plans to open up by giving the specification to the Association for Information and Image Management (AIIM) which was to lay the groundwork for ISO certification.
The ISO has issued a press release about the new standard (named "ISO 32000-1:2008"), along with a quote from Adobe Chief Technology Officer Kevin Lynch about the move expanding the PDF universe. "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," Lynch said. It's nearly verbatim with what he said back in the AIIM hand-off, but holds true to what typically happens when any file format is ISO certified. They'll typically become more attractive to governments and large corporate customers.
As for consumers, the PDF format has been a hit or miss affair on the Web. PDFs are well-known for taking a long time to open in browsers with Adobe's own Reader software. Others like Apple have come in and integrated PDF reading into its Safari browser, while users of Firefox have sought third-party solutions like Foxit to speed up the process. Likewise, PDF search results on Google have had an "open as HTML" option for some time now, letting users forgo formatting for speed.
Other recent file formats that received ISO certification include Microsoft's Office Open XML format, which passed a vote for approval back in April.
Flash has not been easily searchable until now, but Adobe Systems is working with leading search engines Google and Yahoo to solve the problem. CNET News.com Editor in Chief Dan Farber and reporter Elinor Mills discuss the impact of making Flash pages more visible to search engines. One question is whether Microsoft, which developed Silverlight, a competitor to Flash, will also index Flash files in its search engine.
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Adobe released on Tuesday the first Reader application to bake movies and animation into the Portable Document Format.
With Adobe Reader 9, users can play Flash movies, Shockwave animation, and other rich media content without needing to open a third-party player.
With Reader 9, one click would play a Flash movie embedded in the PDF shown here.
(Credit: CNET Networks)PDFs are reaching new levels of interactivity with this release. Past versions of the nearly ubiquitous and free application, by contrast, have enabled dynamic forms but served largely to open print-ready PDFs.
The update is supposed to load more quickly than version 8, addressing the gripes of many users who felt that Reader slowed down Web surfing.
Adobe has described this release as potentially leading to a one-size-fits-all media player. Acrobat 9, released in June at between $299 to $699, will embed video and animation within PDFs.
Acrobat 9 document-creation software can embed videos and animation as well as custom-developed applications alongside maps that preserve geospatial data, 3D models, images, word processing documents, spreadsheets, and presentations in common formats. The priciest, Pro Extended flavor of Acrobat can convert multiple video formats into Flash.
Security enhancements to the refresh of Acrobat and Reader include support for digital signatures and 256-bit AES encryption.
Adobe's launch of an online word processor and conferencing tool via Acrobat.com in June enables users to comment and collaborate simultaneously on documents, and to convert documents to PDFs.
The Adobe Reader 9 download for Windows and Macs requires at least 128MB of RAM on either a Windows 2000 SP4 or newer system, or an Apple Mac G4 or newer running OS 10.4.11 or higher, respectively.
Adobe announced late Monday night that it was providing optimized Adobe Flash Player technology to Google and Yahoo to help them better index dynamic Web content and rich Internet applications that include the Shockwave Flash file (SWF) format.
It sounds exciting, but what exactly does it mean for Web searchers, Webmasters, and Flash creators? CNET News.com asked Adobe, Google, and Yahoo and got some answers.
Q: What is Adobe doing?
A: Adobe is providing Google and Yahoo with optimized Adobe Flash Player technology so that their search engine spiders will be able to find and index SWF content, including Flash "gadgets" such as buttons or menus and self-contained Flash Web sites.
Q: How does this work?
A: When a search engine spider hits a normal HTML page and encounters Flash content it will load it in an optimized Flash player on the search engine server. Google has developed an algorithm that explores Flash files in the same way a person would, such as by clicking on buttons and entering input. The algorithm then indexes all the text it encounters through the navigation.
Q: How will the search experience change as a result?
A: The text that people see when they interact with Flash files, such as captions and introductions, will now be used when Google generates a snippet that appears below the URL on the search results page. The words that appear in the Flash files can now be used to match query terms in Google searches. In addition, the URLs that appear in Flash files will be fed into Google's crawling system and be indexed.
Overall, more content will be indexed and search engine result rankings will change to reflect the additional content and its relevance. The snippets will give better information about the page on the search results. You can also expect search engine optimizers to figure out ways to improve rankings of Flash-based Web sites just like they do with HTML-based sites.
Q: Why is this necessary?
A: More than 98 percent of the Internet-connected desktops have Flash Player installed and Flash is hugely popular. Until now, the search engines were able to index some static text and links within SWF files, but much of the content was not getting indexed because of the dynamic aspect of the rich media files. Currently, all that content that was essentially invisible to the search engines will appear in the search results and the small amount of content that gets indexed appears on the search results page in jumbled words and code that are of no use to the Web searcher.
"Now, you are losing all the context of what content was near each other and running at the same time," says Justin Everett-Church, a senior product manager for Adobe Flash Player. He likened the impact to the difference between reading the index of a book and reading the contents of the book.
This screen shot shows what results look like on Google for Flash content that is indexed without optimization with the new Adobe Flash Player Technology.
(Credit: Google)Q: Do Flash developers or Web masters have to do anything differently?
A: No. However, blog site Search Engine Land suggested that Flash developers should still spend time on search engine optimization and create distinct URLs for each piece of content.
Q: Will searchers be able to see more Flash-based content composed only of images and video as a result of this optimization?
A: Not at this time. Only text and hyperlinks will be indexed. However, Everett-Church said "there is no reason why images and video can't be supported in the future. It's up to our search partners if and when they choose to do that, but it is a possibility." A Google representative declined to comment on any future plans.
Q: Any other limitations?
A: Yes. Google doesn't crawl all types of JavaScript, which is used to execute most of the Flash content on the Internet. Google won't specify which types of JavaScript are executed, but said the company was working on executing all types. Adobe's Everett-Church says: "This is our initial implementation... I think there will be some areas to expand on there, as well."
In addition, text in all languages is supported with the Flash optimization, except for bi-directional languages such as Hebrew and Arabic.
Q: When will Web searchers see the impact of these changes?
A: Google has already started rolling out the changes. Yahoo expects to offer improved Web search capabilities for SWF content in a future Yahoo Search update, but could not specify when that might come.
Q: Will this optimization mean Web surfers will see more Flash pages?
A: "This will change the way sites are designed," Everett-Church says. "It will allow more creative ways of interacting with the browser...and sites won't have to sacrifice searchability."
Q: Can Google users disable the optimization if they don't want to see more Flash results?
A: Sort of. Google users can go into Advanced Search Features and put a minus sign for "filetype:swf." But this will only eliminate pages that are SWF extensions and not necessarily all pages with Flash embedded in them.
Q: Will Adobe be providing the technology to Microsoft for use on Live Search?
A: An Adobe spokesman said the company couldn't comment on its work with other vendors, but said it is exploring ways to make the technology more broadly available. Microsoft has a competing technology to Flash, called Silverlight. A Microsoft spokesman was attempting to get comment about the company's plans on Tuesday.
More information about the effort is available on Adobe's Web site and through Google's Webmaster Central Blog.
Adobe Systems is helping Google and Yahoo to uncover Web content that was previously "invisible" to Web searches.
Both companies have been given optimized Adobe Flash Player technology to help them better index dynamic Web content and rich Internet applications that include the Flash file format, or Shockwave Flash, Adobe said in a statement. Search engines already index static text and links within Shockwave Flash files, but rich Internet applications and dynamic Web content are elusive to search engines because of their changing states, Adobe noted.
Adobe's technology means that millions of pre-existing RIAs that use Flash technology, including content that loads at runtime, are immediately searchable without alteration by companies or developers, Adobe said. Google has already added the optimized Flash Player to its search engine, while Yahoo plans to add the technology to a future update of Yahoo Search.
"Designers and Web developers have long been frustrated that search engines couldn't better access the information within their content created with Flash technology. It's great to see Adobe and the search engines working directly together to improve the situation," Danny Sullivan, editor in chief of SearchEngineLand.com, said in a statement. "The changes should help unlock information that's previously been 'invisible' and will likely result in a better experience for searchers."
Adobe on Wednesday released a revamped version of its Acrobat document creation software that includes built-in support for Flash and multimedia content.
Acrobat 9 lets users convert MOV and WMV files to Flash content that can be embedded within PDFs alongside audio content and even 3D models. The free Acrobat Reader 9 will play the movies, eliminating the need to open other media players.
Adobe released a beta test version of Acrobat 9 earlier this month, along with a new online service called Acrobat.com that includes a Web-based word processor, conferencing and remote access, PDF creation, and 5 gigabytes of file storage.
In combination with the Acrobat.com service, Acrobat 9 lets multiple users collaborate in real-time online to share documents.
The new PDF Portfolios feature in Acrobat 9 lets users drag and drop documents and multimedia content into a single PDF document, then choose from myriad layout and presentation options.
Acrobat Pro Extended 9 will enable maps to be marked up, preserving latitude and longitude.
(Credit: CNET Networks)Mapping features only in Acrobat Pro Extended 9 preserve geospatial coordinates and enable users to mark locations and measure distances.
The new Acrobat will take snapshots of Web pages and convert entire pages or chunks of them to a PDF that preserves links and animation.
Developers can tweak layouts with Flex Builder 3 or Flash CS3.
Acrobat 9 comes in three flavors: Standard at $299 (or $99 to upgrade), Pro for $449 (or $159 to upgrade), and Pro Extended for $699 (or $229 to upgrade). Pro Extended also comes with Adobe Presenter, which plugs into Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 for adding interactivity to presentations.
Adobe said that Adobe Reader 9, the free PDF document reader, will be available early next month.
CNET's Elsa Wenzel contributed to this report.
Apple, continuing its reliance on open-source technologies, is using an open-source project called SproutCore to provide rich Internet applications like its new MobileMe service.
The idea is to use to keep Apple from being "locked into the browser plug-ins for...one particular standard."
What is SproutCore? From the SproutCore Web site:
SproutCore is a framework for building applications in JavaScript with remarkably little amounts of code. It can help you build full "thick" client applications in the Web browser that can create and modify data, often completely independent of your Web server, communicating with your server via Ajax only when they need to save or load data.
SproutCore gives Apple a way to enrich its Web experience without locking itself into any other vendor's technology, as the SproutCore site notes:
... Read moreAdobe Systems is updating and expanding its LiveCycle software for building business-oriented Web applications.
The company on Tuesday is expected to announce LiveCycle Enterprise Suite Update 1, which adds new content management features along with tools to more quickly build financial services and government applications.
LiveCycle is one of the primary products in Adobe's enterprise business. The product is designed for applications that involve document exchanges inside and outside of organizations, such as government Web sites that require people to fill out and process claims. It uses Adobe's PDF and Flex software to create paperless, Web-based applications.
The new release also includes two new components: LiveCycle Content Services ES, and LiveCycle PDF Generator 3D ES.
The Content Services component, developed in conjunction with Alfresco Software, lets companies build a process or application linked to existing enterprise content. For instance, companies can use the tool to create a system for connecting manufacturers to parts suppliers, or for linking hospitals to insurers.
The PDF Generator 3D ES component is targeted at the manufacturing industry and allows companies to share two- and three-dimensional models in PDF format. The component works with more than 40 CAD applications, according to Adobe.
LiveCycle ES Update 1 will be available next month, Adobe said.
Veoh, an online video site, sure can attract VIP investors.
The company announced that it has received another round of funding, this time for $30 million, from such new backers as Intel and Adobe Systems. Previous investors include Goldman Sachs and former Disney CEO Michael Eisner.
Veoh, once widely referred to as a video-sharing company, has taken to calling itself an Internet TV service. The term video sharing is considered an unattractive label for a company--unless you're YouTube, that is. It implies that you're trying to take on the powerhouse, and almost everyone has given up on doing that.
Veoh is still under pressure from YouTube and Hulu, the video start-up created by NBC Universal and News Corp. that launched earlier in the year and has received glowing reviews. For all its star power and money, Veoh can't seem to break out of the pack of also-ran video sites.
The company's valuation is in the $120 million range, and the total money raised is $70 million, according to Silicon Alley Insider.
The company reports that it has accumulated 28 million viewers who spend on average more than 100 minutes each month on the site. These are respectable numbers, although they pale compared with YouTube. The Google-owned site boasts more than 300 million users worldwide.
Adobe unveiled an online community Monday with a word processor; file storage and sharing; and deep tie-ins to a newly Flash-enabled Acrobat 9.
The online push for Acrobat is a bold move for a brand perhaps best associated with the free and nearly ubiquitous Acrobat Reader, which opens print-ready Portable Document Format, or PDF, files. Now, PDFs will play movies.
The announcement comes in advance of the release of Acrobat 9 document-creation software, which adds dynamic features such as integration of animation, dynamic maps, 256-bit encryption, and improved forms.
The free Acrobat.com beta includes the Buzzword word processor. Its ConnectNow Web conferencing and desktop sharing tool enables chatting via text, video, and voice. The hosted services invite file storage and sharing with the capability to convert up to five documents to PDF.
Buzzword and companion tools would provide interactivity lacking in leading online word processors such as Google Docs.
The free Acrobat.com launched in beta mode on Monday.
(Credit: Adobe Systems)Users can store files on Acrobat.com and join each other in virtual meeting rooms to share identical document views in real time. The site also can host data from forms created in Acrobat software.
Acrobat 9 document-creation software will arrive with a slew of support for creating interactive, secure documents and integration with Acrobat.com.
Acrobat users can convert MOV and WMV files to Flash content that can be embedded within PDFs alongside audio content and even 3D models. The free Acrobat Reader 9 will play the movies, eliminating the need to open other media players.
The new PDF Portfolios feature in Acrobat 9 lets users drag and drop content into a portfolio, then choose from myriad layout and presentation options.
Mapping features only in Acrobat Pro Extended 9 preserve geospatial coordinates and enable users to mark locations and measure distances.
The next Acrobat will take snapshots of Web pages and convert entire pages or chunks of them to a PDF that preserves links and animation.
Developers can tweak layouts with Flex Builder 3 or Flash CS3.
The new Acrobat.com will enable users to stash their work, edit documents, and collaborate with each other.
(Credit: Adobe Systems)Adobe also tried to make it easier to for companies to make pages match visually with themes and custom logos, and it improved tools for comparing documents.
For creating online forms, Acrobat 9 adds intelligence to recognize content for conversion to fillable fields. And a forms tracking dashboard will show, for instance, the status of responses to a mass party invitation e-mail and let a user send reminders to guests. Responses can be sorted, filtered, and exported to spreadsheets.
Acrobat 9's security enhancements enable users to add 256-bit encryption, used by banks online, to PDFs.
Redaction tools, a key selling point of Acrobat 8, will offer searches for numeric patterns in addition to multiple words and phrases. A company could, for example, find every accidental mention of a social security number or top-secret product being developed and black out the potential leaks from a PDF with one blow.
Business users could opt to access documents at Acrobat online or via SharePoint workspaces, network folders or WebDAV.
Acrobat Pro Extended 9 will enable maps to be marked up, preserving latitude and longitude.
(Credit: CNET Networks)Acrobat 9 comes in three flavors, set for stores in the coming weeks: Standard at $299 or $99 to upgrade, Pro for $449 or $159 to upgrade, and Pro Extended for $699 or $229 to upgrade. Pro Extended also comes with Adobe Presenter, which plugs into Microsoft PowerPoint 2007 for adding interactivity to presentations.
We'll have a review of Acrobat 9 software once we receive final code, and we'll share our experiences soon with Acrobat.com beta.
I still groan when I have to open a PDF file from the Web (my PCs make loud grinding noises), so I'm curious to see how the new tools might make PDFs faster to open as well as more dynamic to explore.
PDF Portfolios in Acrobat 9 will package FLV and SWF content with the usual word processing files and more.
(Credit: CNET Networks)
