I must confess that I’m by no means an expert on the ins and outs of the PDF. Having said that, I must also confess that, since beginning this blog and writing articles for the company website, I’ve learned A LOT. And with that in mind, I thought it would be fun to share in the learning.
I’ve been wanting to do a series of postings for a while now and thought, what better topic to do it on than the ABC’s of the PDF? I’ll be researching tidbits surrounding the PDF, getting you to know the format in a different way. I’ll also include links to articles, both new and old, as well as to relevant sites if you’re interested in reading more about a topic so that I don’t leave you in the lurch (you can only cover so much in a blog entry!). So, if you’re ready for it, we’ll start (where else?) at the beginning.
Adobe System, Inc.
Proprietor of the PDF format, Adobe System, Inc. was founded in 1982 by John Warnock and Charles Geschke (current Chairmen of the Board for Adobe). This company has been ranked and recognized in top business magazines, such as Fortune and BusinessWeek and currently consists of approximately 5,879 employees worldwide. In addition, the PDF actually makes up almost 10% of web content on the internet today. Did you know that the company, itself, was named after a creek in Los Altos, California located behind Warnock’s home? There’s even an Adobe Day on December 2, which was established in San Jose in honour of the company’s 20th anniversary in 2002. Does the company get the day off for that one?
Bruce Chizen
What is the history behind this PDF household name? In a 2001 interview with PlanetPDF, Chizen stated: “ ‘In five years I hope people can look back and base my legacy on what we were able to do with Acrobat.’ ” Well, five years later, Acrobat is more capable than ever and his legacy is safe. Since March of 2001, Bruce Chizen has been the president and CEO of Adobe Systems Inc., coming into his new role after having been with the company since 1994. For those 6 years in between, he’s held top head positions over the professional graphics division and Adobe’s consumer division. In his pre-Adobe days during the eighties, Chizen worked for Claris Corporation, Mattel Electronics and Microsoft where he gained the background and experience that would lead him to becoming Adobe’s head honcho.
Camelot Project
This project was the conception of the PDF, itself, as we know it today. As part of PDF history , the original document was written by John Warnock, as CEO of Adobe in the spring of 1991. Camelot was essentially geared towards making the fundamental elements of PostScript and PostScript Printers more efficient both electronically and economically. In the original document, Warnock envisions the technology, software, and implications of what, with innovation, the application of PostScript language could achieve: documents that were universally viewable. “This capability,” Warnock states,“would truly change the way information is managed. Large centrally maintained databases of documents could be accessed remotely and selectively printed remotely. This would save millions of dollars in document inventory costs.” The culminating result: PDF. The original name, ‘Camelot’, however, was later renamed to ‘Carousel’, which is said to be the reason why the PDF file type on Macintosh was ‘CARO’.
Okay, so that’s it for this series posting—don’t want to give away too much all at once now. There’s still more to come. Stay tuned for the next posting in the series where I’ll look into the nuts and bolts behind the PDF features which you use on a day to day basis.