PDF to get an engineering edit

AIIM, a trade group for the content management software industry, and printing trade group NPES announced plans Monday to work with Adobe Systems to develop a variation of its portable document format (PDF) optimized for engineering documents. The PDF Engineering (PDF/E) Working Group will include representatives from Adobe, Hewlett-Packard, Intel and others. PDF/E will build on the main PDF format to allow more detailed display of engineering and design information.

"With this new PDF/E standard, engineering professionals will be able to reliably create, exchange and review large format documents," AIIM President John Mancini said in a statement. PDF is widely used to distribute documents ranging from tax forms to product brochures, but Adobe's competitors have criticized it as inadequate for conveying complex technical and design documents.