ISO 32000 : The ballot has closed. And the results are ...
It's not "done", but the vote is in. The ISO TC 171 SC2 countries voted overwhelmingly to approve PDF as ISO 32000. This Draft International Standard does have comments to resolve, and we plan to take part in the larger international community in fixing all those commentary details. And then, even more fun, where does the world want PDF to go?
As always, the abiity of converting a defacto standard to a formal standard, while not easy, is still a process with a clear target. It's the next journey that can prove difficult. When we start figuring out, in committee, what the standard should do next, it requires dedicated, committed folks, with suitable time and energy, to build the specification for the new stuff. and that has to be balanced against where the standard is in use, and where the (technological) world is going.
This has een a long year of effort on our part. We've worked hard internally to create a great specification that fully aligned with our Adobe PDf 1.7 specification, while removing all product dependencies. We've made sure that the legal use of the specification and standard are fair to all, and to some limits, will remain fair. We've not gotten into peoples faces, (but we have wondered what's going on a lot). And a few of us may have had a few sleepless nights over the last weekend, waiting to hear if we had managed to make this real.
So, where does Adobe go from here?
Well, keep in mind that there is a difference in a standard on technology and an implementation that follows the standard. We can and will evolve our products, while working to offer directions for the PDF standard. But then, with the adoption and process into FDIS (Final Draft International Standard), Adobe doesn't control the specification, but is now part of the world for creating the next generation of PDF.
So, keep watching this space... and it's time for a nap.