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> PDF's main downside is the remarkable unevenness of the quality of the creation and reading tools Funny enough, I think one of the reasons PDF became so popu

> PDF's main downside is the remarkable unevenness of the quality of the creation and reading tools Funny enough, I think one of the reasons PDF became so popular, is because it was originally seen as a "difficult / impossible to modify file that can be downloaded as a file and read in a static way". The lack of editing tools in the most popular PDF reader for a long time (Acrobat Reader) was the reason it became such a widely used format. Especially compared to distributing a .doc or .docx where the user can easily accidentally change something.

DrAwdeOccarim 6y ago
That's why I use it at work. If I don't pay for my employees to get Acrobat Pro, or allow them to install software outside of a helpdesk tickets, then I know a PDF they generate using our lab management software is unadulterated. It's part of our data verification policy. It's not that I think my employees with change data nefariously, it's that they may want to edit the layout and accidentally change a numerical value.
- davidgerard 6y ago
  LibreOffice Draw is pretty good for editing PDFs - if you have all the matching fonts. So I wouldn't go assuming people can't edit PDFs.
  - drawkbox 6y ago
    The document can be tampersealed to help prevent or at least notify of that. In a way a locked tampersealed document is a pretty decent template for parsing data as well. It is messy as PDFs always are but a decent lib and a consistent source with sealed docs can be used for decently verifiable scraping. For instance some sort of license, certification or official document like tax forms, it can be generated with a common output, tampersealed and then reliably parsed after verification.
  - DrAwdeOccarim 6y ago
    They'd need to put in a ticket to get it installed, which I would need to approve. But also, this isn't to stop malice it's to stop accidental edits. I can't stop my employees from messing with things if they want to. That's where the trust part and common goals come into play.
- alsdkfjkqjwer 6y ago
  > (assuming employee lack of ability/tools) It's part of our data verification policy That's a silly proposition. sounds like you need to learn about hashing and signatures...
- frandroid 6y ago
  Don't these users have a recent version of MS Word?
ubermonkey 6y ago
That's absolutely what we use it for. It's a "terminal" format for documentation we distribute to customers. We don't want to send out .docx.
- aj7 6y ago
  Exactly.

DrAwdeOccarim 6y ago

That's why I use it at work. If I don't pay for my employees to get Acrobat Pro, or allow them to install software outside of a helpdesk tickets, then I know a PDF they generate using our lab management software is unadulterated. It's part of our data verification policy. It's not that I think my employees with change data nefariously, it's that they may want to edit the layout and accidentally change a numerical value.

davidgerard 6y ago
LibreOffice Draw is pretty good for editing PDFs - if you have all the matching fonts. So I wouldn't go assuming people can't edit PDFs.
- drawkbox 6y ago
  The document can be tampersealed to help prevent or at least notify of that. In a way a locked tampersealed document is a pretty decent template for parsing data as well. It is messy as PDFs always are but a decent lib and a consistent source with sealed docs can be used for decently verifiable scraping. For instance some sort of license, certification or official document like tax forms, it can be generated with a common output, tampersealed and then reliably parsed after verification.
- DrAwdeOccarim 6y ago
  They'd need to put in a ticket to get it installed, which I would need to approve. But also, this isn't to stop malice it's to stop accidental edits. I can't stop my employees from messing with things if they want to. That's where the trust part and common goals come into play.
alsdkfjkqjwer 6y ago
> (assuming employee lack of ability/tools) It's part of our data verification policy That's a silly proposition. sounds like you need to learn about hashing and signatures...
frandroid 6y ago
Don't these users have a recent version of MS Word?

ubermonkey 6y ago

That's absolutely what we use it for. It's a "terminal" format for documentation we distribute to customers. We don't want to send out .docx.

aj7 6y ago
Exactly.