The International Organization for Standardization recently published a new standard for the management of Web-based PDF documents. ISO 19005, or PDF/A-1, enables organizations to archive documents in a way that maximizes content preservation and appearance over an extended period of time. It also allows documents to be retrieved and rendered with a consistent and predictable result in the future, independent of the tools and systems originally used for creating, storing and rendering the files. PDF is an acronym for Portable Document Format.

“The standard will allow libraries, archives and other electronic resource consumers to encourage their content providers to produce and deliver those resources in a form that is optimized for their effective preservation over time,” says Stephan Abrams, Harvard University Digital Library program manager. “The publication of PDF/A-1 will have a significant impact on the preservation of electronic documents by defining an internationally recognized standard format that is amenable to long-term preservation.”

ISO estimates that the total size of the surface Web is 167 terabytes, 9.2 percent of which consists of PDF documents. One terabyte is equivalent to the size of a large public library.

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