PDF is an open standard, except when it's not
PDF is an open standard, except when it's not
Posted Jun 9, 2025 14:05 UTC (Mon) by marcH (subscriber, #57642)In reply to: PDF is an open standard, except when it's not by DemiMarie
Parent article: The importance of free software to science
I tried opening a dynamic XFA form on pdf.is and it went much further than everything I tried before, thanks for the recommendation! I can at least see and fill the form, that's great progress. However the form also shows:
> JavaScript has been disabled, the form requires JavaScript to validate properly.
>
> Please enable JavaScript through Preferences under the Edit menu and reopen the form.
The "Validate" and "Clear Form" have no effect.
Maybe it would work better with a higher subscription tiers? But even if it does, we're straying away from "open", "portable" and "reproducible"...
I also tried to convert it to PDF/A and the output still shows "Please Wait..."
I admit dynamic XFA is unlikely to be used by a scientist. But 1. you never know 2. there could be other proprietary extensions.
tl;dr: beware proprietary extensions.