subject: Going Green With Portable Document Format [print this page] The modern world has taken huge leaps and bounds in all spheres of life. It has made tremendous improvements in technology and alleviated the life of mankind. This progress has brought with itself many adverse changes. The development in science and technology has affected the geographical environment of the earth drastically. Environment pollution is one such problems being faced by mankind. However, computer technology has introduced applications and programs to contribute to the reduction in environmental pollution. Portable Document Format is one of these applications that have been developed to reduce the paper work. It was introduced by Adobe in 1993 with an aim to introduce paperless office.
How does PDF help in promoting green and clean environment?
A Portable Document Format is a non-editable format that integrates maximum amount of information in a document. It is a format that is easily transmittable from one computer system to another. It is portable in nature as one can have access to this format on any system with different configuration. This feature of PDF file is useful as compared to the use of papers. Paper documents require courier costs in delivering a message or document. The paper documents also require printing expenditure, maintenance costs and other such costs. Office papers require photocopiers, printers, faxing, copying and scanning. The shipping of the office papers consumes time and other resources of an organization. No such costs are involved with the use of PDF files. The PDF format has compression algorithms that squeeze the file size making it transferable. The original layout in the PDF document remains intact even while transferring the file through emails. While sending office papers there are chances of papers getting spoilt or damaged in transportation. A PDF also supports hyperlinks, bookmarks and multimedia elements. This provides a viewer with extra information and makes a file visually appealing. The office papers can accommodate only limited amount of information. If it includes extensive information then the pdf to word document becomes bulky and difficult to manage.
Using PDF files you can create newsletters, invoices, contracts, advertisements, legal copies and much more. It makes the task of businesses flexible and manageable. Unlike the office papers PDF files eliminate the consumption of time, money and energy of the users.
