PDF Conference offers expert advice, real-world solutions

Jan 22, 2004 12:00 PM, by Hal Hinderliter, Contributing editor | hal@hinderliter.com

Carl Young’s latest PDF Conference allowed eager attendees the opportunity to explore the PDF universe. Exhibits included an Adobe booth that nearly equaled the size of their presence at GraphExpo, as well as vendors including ARTS PDF, EnFocus, Global Graphics and activePDF. Featuring two educational tracks, the agenda covered a broad list of topics aimed at corporate users, graphics production, education and other niche audiences.

Top-notch speakers including Dov Issacs (Adobe), Ted Padova (author), Sandee Cohen (author), David Zwang (consultant), Julie Shaffer (GATF) and Leonard Rosenthal (PDF Sages) provided content for this six-day marathon event, consisting of a three-day conference flanked by two days of preconference sessions and a single post-conference intensive focus day. Levity was also on the menu, in the form of a Monday night Jeopardy event hosted by activePDF CEO Tim Sullivan followed by a reception honoring the five-year anniversary of Planet PDF.

The eighth edition of DigiPub Solutions’ semi-annual gathering provided a solutions-oriented atmosphere for attendees, with sessions focused on real-world examples. “What I really want to see is Acrobat up on screen, and someone showing people how to fix a problem or do something new,” notes Carl Young, President of DigiPub Solutions and founder of the PDF Conference.

With a total attendance of 200, the event offered an intimate atmosphere that encouraged interaction—a result in keeping with Young’s vision. “Here they can talk to people who are experts in all kinds of fields, listen to their presentations and get their questions answered.”

Even the experts share in the benefits, according to renowned author and lecturer Sandee Cohen. “I’m blown away by the quality of expertise at this conference,” raves Cohen. “A casual conversation over morning coffee turned into a full-blown examination of PDF objects with a third-party developer.”

“I look forward to the PDF Conference. Attendees are knowledgeable on the products and PDF as a file format,” said Lori DeFurio, Developer Evangelist, Adobe PDF Tools, “Questions raised during the sessions are insightful and on point." DeFurio delivered presentations on Acrobat 6 Collaboration and PDF/XML Forms in addition to judging the Jeopardy competition; she was also one of the vendors taking part in the PDF Conference’s innovative “Lunch-and-Learn” sessions, hour-long product demonstrations.

Ted Padova, noted PDF author whose titles include the newly published “Adobe Acrobat 6 PDF Bible,” exposed new multimedia features in Acrobat 6 (such as the ability to embed Flash animations). MicroType’s Shlomo Perets joined a prepress seminar that included lectures from Julie Shaffer, David Zwang, Michael Jahn and others. Business forms applications were another hot topic, with established e-form vendor Amgraf at the opposite end of the exhibition area from upstart FormRouter, while Adobe provided some pre-release peeks at its new version of Form Designer.

Although PDF fans will have to wait until early June 2004 for the next PDF Conference (to be held in Washington, D.C.), PDF Conference founder Carl Young encourages everyone to download and enjoy the presentations from Anaheim, available at PlanetPDF. More information regarding upcoming PDF Conferences is available from the DigiPub website at www.pdfconference.com.