Mapsoft Blogs

Summary of the Structure of PDF files PDF can be looked upon as a combination of different file types presented in a single container. The reason for this is that a PDF file contains Text, vector art, images, fonts and other file format can be embedded - even the native files that were used to create the PDF in the first place. An object orientated file format with were items can be connected directly or indirectly to each other.  The objects within a PDF file can be divided into the following types: Dictionaries A group containing direct or references to indirect objects. Dictionaries can be seen as the glue holding together the elements in a PDF files. The example below shows the structure of a typical page dictionary: The Contents stream has an attributes dictionary that contains a filter name and the length of the stream The CropBox array contains the coordinates of the rectangle that defines the area that is visible on the page. The MediaBox array contains the coordinates of the r

Understanding of Color and Color models There are a number of color models but I am only going to cover 2 here as they are the most often used.  RGB This color model is primarily used to describe light. It is used mainly in cameras and scanners. It has 3 color elements that when added together at 100% represent white or pure light. The 3 different colors are Red, Green and Blue. The color model is almost infinite in its range and this in itself is ok until printing is required and that printing is being done through the CMYK color model. The model uses 3 values with each being in a range between 0 and 255 as in the Windows and applications such as Photoshop or as a decimal number up to a maximum of 1 in PDF for example.  RGB is an additive color model. Adding all of the colors in equal amounts will result in white. In the web world RGB colours are represented by hex number combinations (the numbering system is ). So for example Red would be #FF0000, Green would be #00FF00 and Blue woul

What is an Acrobat Plug-in? Acrobat plug-ins are software components that extend the functionality of Adobe Acrobat, a popular program for viewing, creating, and editing PDF documents. Plug-ins can add new features to Acrobat, such as the ability to create interactive forms, add watermarks, or perform advanced document processing tasks. Some plug-ins are developed by Adobe, while others are created by third parties. These plug-ins can be installed within the Acrobat application and are typically activated when a particular action or task is performed within the software. Why do we need plug-ins? To make Adobe Acrobat more flexible and applicable to a broader range of industries and organizations, the number of built-in features must be restricted to the wider community. This is because adding features that serve only a small portion of Acrobat's user base would unnecessarily increase the application's size. Consequently, plug-ins are required to add functionality as required by

The Adobe PDF Library The Adobe PDF library can be seen basically as a software developer version of Adobe Acrobat but without the user interface however, it is far more than that. Platform availability Acrobat is a Windows and Mac application, but the PDF library is available on far more platforms. The library is available on the following operating systems: Windows 32-bit Windows 64-bit Mac 32-bit Mac 64-bit Linux 32-bit Linux 64-bit Solaris Sparc 32-bit Solaris Sparc 64-bit Solaris Intel 32-bit Solaris Intel 64-bit AIX 32-bit AIX 64-bit HP/UX PA-RISC 32-bit HP/UX PA-RISC 64-bit HP/UX Itanium 32-bit HP/UX Itanium 64-bit Where is it used? The library is integrated into Adobe's CC (Creative Cloud) applications, such as Adobe InDesign, Adobe PhotoShop, and Adobe Illustrator, and is available as an OEM offering to third-party companies. Our licensing and experience Mapsoft has extensive experience working with the Adobe PDF library and the Ado