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TEN YEARS OF PDF MASTERS OF PDF SECURITY & ACCESSIBILITY PRINT, DESIGN & CREATION USING ACROBAT/BEST PRACTICE THE FUTURE OF PDF Prev Home Next CHAPTER INDEX ADVERTISEMENT TEN YEARS OF PDF DESIGN & CREATION •Contents • Adobe’s Gary Cosimini reflects on ‘First • The PDF/X Solution •Ten years of PDF Acrobat PDF Decade • A first look at Adobe Reader 6 •Masters of PDF • PDF Makes Computerworld’s top 35 list • PDF as necessary evil •Security & accessibility • The past, present and future of PDF • The Making of Good PDFs •Design & creation • Giving PDF a Chance – Really • 100 Portable Historical Educational •Acrobat best practice �� • Bill Gates biographer suggests Microsoft ‘Milestone Documents’ •Future of PDF ���� ����������� ��� ceded key format victory to Adobe PDF ACROBAT BEST PRACTICE • Top 25 Best-selling Adobe Acrobat/PDF products for 2002 • Helping Reader Orientation MASTERS OF PDF • PDF usability put to the test �� ����� ��� ���� �� ���� • Exploring Full Screen mode ��� ���� ��� ��� ��� ��� • Max Wyss �������� � �������� ������� ���� ������ ���������� • John Warnock • Turning paper into searchable PDFs ��� �������� ��� ��������� �� ���� ����� ���������� � ������ ����� ��������� �� �������� ��� ��� • Aandi Inston • Opening Acrobat Faster II �������� ������� ���������� ��� ���� ��� �������� • Ted Padova ������������ �� ���� ��������� ��� ����������� FUTURE OF PDF �� ���� ���� �� ����� • Pattie Belle Hastings • Planet PDF takes first look at Acrobat 6 �������� ��� ������� ��������� �������� ���������� SECURITY & ACCESSIBILITY �� ��� ���� ���� ��� ��������� ���� �������� ����� • Planet PDF’s take on Acrobat 6.0 ��� ������ ������� ������ ������� ��������� ��� ��� • Duff Johnson offers strategic review of ����� ��� �� � �������� �� ��� ���� �� ���������� • The first thoughts on Acrobat 6: ���������� �������� ���� ���� ����� ������� ������ PDF accessibility Leonard Rosenthol • ElcomSoft found *Not Guilty* on DMCA charges • Digital memory loss www.activePDF.com • PDF Sniper Letter More Revealing Than • Acrobat Expectations: Chizen Bets the PAGE 2 of 71 Intended Farm on PDF Cash Cow Copyright © 1997-2003 BinaryThing Pty Ltd | All Rights Reserved | www.planetpdf.com | Planet PDF - a World of Adobe Acrobat and PDF Resources. Prev Home Next CHAPTER INDEX Business Development Director of Adobe’s did you first learn about Acrobat, what Creative Professional Product Group, about it appealed to you as someone with •Contents TEN YEARS OF PDF also is the person from whom I first heard a publishing background – why were you •Ten years of PDF about a unique software product code- so interested in it that you left a job with •Masters of PDF named “Carousel.” We recently linked up the Times? ADOBE’S GARY COSIMINI with him to reflect on his career-changing •Security & accessibility REFLECTS ON ‘FIRST ACROBAT interest in Acrobat and PDF, and to trace PDF DECADE •Design & creation some of the highlights of the product and •Acrobat best practice Will give keynote at DigiPub Solutions’ PDF format’s soon-to-be 10-year history (it was Conference in June introduced in New York on June 15, 1993). •Future of PDF By Kurt Foss, Planet PDF Editor PLANET PDF: EDITOR’S NOTE: GARY COSIMINI: Gary, thanks for agreeing to talk with Planet PDF is a founding co-spon- “Actually, the betting line at the time was Planet PDF about your work at Adobe sor of the PDF Conference that I’d join Apple! Systems in general and, in particular, the (www.pdfconference.com), developed and first decade of Adobe Acrobat and PDF. I was introduced to Acrobat by Wes hosted by DigiPub Solutions Corp., and we Let’s back up the tape up to a point before Lem, this great guy from Adobe’s New were delighted to learn recently that Gary the June 1993 public introduction of a York office. He came by one day really Cosimini of Adobe Systems, Inc. will be product-in-development previously known excited and said I had to see this demo. the keynote speaker for the June 2-4 event by its “Carousel” codename. Adobe knew me because I was an early in Bethesda, MD. In the past, this event PostScript enthusiast. While working at has had a significant focus on government We knew you in a previous life as the very The Times, I tracked Adobe’s innovations and enterprise uses and users. For the technology savvy Senior Art Director for closely and implemented a lot of their upcoming event, they’ve added a track The New York Times, someone whose technologies in ways that later became for creative professionals. With Cosimini’s knowledge and experience was widely standard practice. We were among the publishing background – prior to joining respected within the newspaper industry. first users of Illustrator and Photoshop, and Adobe, he was the Senior Art Director Some certainly were surprised when you created workflow and automation tools for The New York Times – and long-term eventually resigned that position to work based upon them for mapping, charting and Acrobat/PDF involvement and interest, for Adobe, especially as a point person for photography. he’s a perfect choice to help commemo- a new and unproven technology we’ve rate ‘The First Acrobat/PDF Decade.’ come to know as Acrobat and PDF. Can The product Wes showed me was a rudimentary document viewer and had a PAGE 3 of 71 Cosimini, still based in New York as the you tell us how that situation evolved: How Copyright © 1997-2003 BinaryThing Pty Ltd | All Rights Reserved | www.planetpdf.com | Planet PDF - a World of Adobe Acrobat and PDF Resources. Prev Home Next CHAPTER INDEX splash screen which said ‘New Technology,’ The application of this technology for customers and developers, and to catalyze not Carousel. It must have been 1991, transmitting finished documents was change in the entire industry. PDF had the •Contents before laptops, and he had to install it on obvious! At the time we were making potential to transform the way literally •Ten years of PDF my computer. It was really, really interest- photostats of pages to distribute by everyone communicates and does their •Masters of PDF ing, so naturally I poked into some of the airfreight overseas and scanning pages at work. files after the demo. This is cool, I thought: high resolution to ‘fax’ them by satellite or •Security & accessibility it’s PostScript for viewing. It had a lot of microwave for printing. If making digital •Design & creation the characteristics of PostScript, but was pages could be as simple as converting a •Acrobat best practice declarative like Illustrator rather than in- PostScript file, everyone would save a lot terpretive, which is good for efficiency, and of money and all that bandwidth could be •Future of PDF had a clear representation of the notion of put to better use. pages and fonts and images. And a Cross The trouble was that very few people Reference Table allowed rapid access to all understood the position of PostScript in the file’s components. What a great idea! the manufacturing chain. I thought Adobe So on January 1, 1992, I made a fateful would need someone to explain this to New Year’s resolution – to ask Adobe ADVERTISEMENT PAGE 4 of 71 Copyright © 1997-2003 BinaryThing Pty Ltd | All Rights Reserved | www.planetpdf.com | Planet PDF - a World of Adobe Acrobat and PDF Resources. Prev Home Next CHAPTER INDEX for a job representing Acrobat. Because of Sales, who taught me just enough about and when there were several competing so many of the industry decision makers the software business to get by. My job products? •Contents essential for Acrobat to succeed came to was to wear a suit, push the mouse, and COSIMINI: •Ten years of PDF work every morning in Manhattan, my one create eggs without chickens; that’s what “In addition to defining features for •Masters of PDF condition was that I work from a New Business Development is. My assignment Acrobat and to PDF, creating a business York base.” was to identify leverage points for Acrobat, •Security & accessibility model and value proposition were the and then craft and implement programs to PLANET PDF: hardest parts of developing the product. At •Design & creation capture these opportunities.” What was your first job title and role? one point in negotiations with a New York •Acrobat best practice PLANET PDF: banking firm, we were told that Acrobat COSIMINI: •Future of PDF What was your expectation for Acrobat was not worth more than a screen saver: “The first day I reported to duty in and PDF in 1993? ouch. Another time, I was actually booed Mountain View was in May 1992 – the by an audience at the Boston Computer same day [Adobe co-founder and former COSIMINI: Society because the Common Ground CEO] Chuck Geschke was kidnapped. I “We all shared John Warnock’s vision and demo guy had to run to the phone and call was sitting in a office not 100 feet away, but were on the same wavelength: We thought out of the line of sight, from the parking it would take five years before anyone ADVERTISEMENT lot where it took place. Chuck impressed recognized how useful this technology everyone with his fortitude and depth of could be, and another five before the character by addressing his employees in whole world took it for granted. If we person the day after he was freed. Adobe achieved that timetable, we’d feel we had grew up a lot that year; I think it became been successful. more serious and committed to doing This was, of course, in the days before something important. Perhaps Acrobat mid-quarterly updates for analysts! Wall provided us with a type of mission, and Street now expects earth-shattering news John and Chuck supplied the imagination every 45 days.” and leadership. PLANET PDF: My job title at Adobe – Business Were you surprised by the less-than-enthu- Development Manager – was something siastic adoption of Acrobat 1.0, back when they found in an HR manual. I reported to Reader was *not* a free product, when Clint Nagy, Adobe’s original Vice President PAGE 5 of 71 the Distiller for the Network *was* free Copyright © 1997-2003 BinaryThing Pty Ltd | All Rights Reserved | www.planetpdf.com | Planet PDF - a World of Adobe Acrobat and PDF Resources.