The Portable Document Format (PDF) was launched by the company Adobe . Texts of this format can be loaded fast, easily printed, and side-exactly quoted; layout and formatting are preserved.

PDF is a universal file format which retains all fonts, formatting, colours and graphics of any source document, regardless of the program and the operating system with which it was created. PDF files are compact (i.e. smaller than the source files) and can be used by each together, be looked and be printed out precisely. Therefor a PDF reader is required, for example the free Adobe Acrobat Reader .

In the following you get some advices for the creation of PDF files. Further information and links about "PDF" you can find for example on the webpages of PDFZone , Planet PDF , PDF-Web and in the online encyklopaedia Wikipedia .

PDF/A is an ISO standard for the use of the PDF format in the long-term preservation of electronic documents.
On the 28th of September, 2005 the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) has agreed to a new standard for the regulation of the preservation of electronic documents:

ISO-19005-1 - Document management - Electronic document file format for long-term preservation - Part 1: Use of PDF 1.4 (PDF/A-1) .

You can find more information about PDF/A at www.pdfa.org .

The following software tools enable a conversion of a document from current word processing systems into a PDF format:

• PDFCreator
  This OpenSource project will help you in creating PDFs.
  From version 0.9.5 PDFCreator can convert also to PDF/A (1b) .
  
  
• Acrobat Professional
  Acrobat professional can create beside normal PDF also PDF/A (from version 8) and runs under Windows and MacOS. Generally Acrobat is integrated as a printer into the system and creates PDF by the printing function of the respective application. Furthermore already available Postscript files and webpages can be converted into PDF. About the Adobe webpages you can get a free, fully functional 30-day trial version .
  
  
• Ghostscript, Ghostview und GSview
  This software for the creation of PDF files is free (publicly domain).
  
  
• Free PDF Creator
  This program is a free online version for PDF and PDF/A creation.
  
  
• FreePDF XP
  The software developer Stefan Heinz has programmed with FreePDF XP a German-speaking and also free interface which makes the creation of PDF files very comfortable. Required is the installation of Ghostscript.
  
  

Also for 2007 Microsoft Office exists an Add-In "Save as - PDF or XPS" which allows you to export and save to the PDF format in eight 2007 Microsoft Office programs (such as Word or Excel).

One can also reach good results with the topical free software from OpenOffice.org . It is possible to create PDF/A.

By now many other programs offer the possibility to create PDF files. You will find the corresponding functions normally in the menus under Save as... or Export .

For the direct conversion of TeX/LaTeX files there is a softwaretool pdftex or rather pdflatex . On the project page you will find information and links for downloads. pdfTeX is included in most modern distributions of LaTeX.