Just noticed via Dare’s blog that Adobe has officially responded to Microsoft’s announcement that PDF will be pulled due to fears of Adobe lawsuits. Then Microsoft comes back with a reassurance that all they’re trying to do is offer the best possible experience for the users that want PDFs from their Office documents and not trying to “extend” PDF.
I am embarassed for whomever at Adobe is causing this whole debacle. Microsoft is in no way trying to muck with the PDF spec. It doesn’t take a lot to check the output and see that they’re simply trying to offer PDF capabilities from the most popular Office Suite on the planet. Why can’t Adobe just make their intentions clear? Either give it a thumbs up or a thumbs down. If thumbs down, spell out clearly why and then Microsoft can fix whatever it is you perceive as a violation of the PDF specification.
Now, people probably think I’m all pro-Microsoft on this (because I usually am :P), but really that’s not the case here. I just believe it’s the best thing for the users. Technically my company, Mimeo, actually loses a certain edge over the competition when Microsoft’s products/platform starts outputting new print ready formats like PDF or XPS. Then again, we can also gain from it in other ways because these technologies are much richer and easier to work with than PostScript, which is what we deal with today.