Adobe PDF vs Microsoft XPS (XML Paper Specification)
Microsoft XPS Document format (earlier Metro), similar in many ways to Adobe PDF, is all set to debut with Windows Vista and Office 12.Microsoft XPS is designed as a direct competitor to Adobe PostScript and PDF, the de-facto standard document format on the Web. Just like PDF, an XPS document is displayed identically on every computer and will represent the "printed page"
Read: How does Microsoft XPS Metro compare with Adobe Acrobat PDF
All Microsoft Office 2007 applications like Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Access, Publisher, Visio, OneNote, and InfoPath would include a Save As XPS in addition to the Save As PDF option (see screenshot). Microsoft will also provide an API for generating XPS documents from any Windows Presentation Foundation WFC applications.Microsoft will also provide an XPS Viewer similar to Adobe Acrobat Reader for viewing XPS documents without needing the actual application which created it. Microsoft XPS reader is available for Windows Vista, Windows XP, and Windows Server 2003.
The Microsoft XPS Document Writer (MXDW) will also be compatible with Windows XP but the current version of MXDW that is available in the SDK of the WinFX CTP is compatible with the WinFX CTP only.
Will Microsoft XPS be able to dislodge Adobe PDF ?
Microsoft XPS success will actually depend on how quickly software vendors and printing hardware manufacturers agree for the development of XPS devices and drivers. And according to Alex Woodie, software developers have started to jump onto Microsoft's XPS bandwagon.
Both Zoran and Software Imaging are developing new products that support the XPS format. Charles LeCompte of Lyra Research also says XPS has a shot at taking some of the shine off PDF.
Andy Simonds posted a screenshot of Microsoft XPS viewer
Microsoft will also release a stand-alone viewer (not integrated into IE) that will also be supported from Windows Vista through Windows 2000. XPS Viewers will also be available for Mac, Linux and Unix platforms.
Microsoft XPS viewer is built on top of Windows Presentation Foundation. Hence, it works on all platforms that support WPF - Vista, Windows XP and Windows Server 2003.
XPS has the potential to grab PDF marketshare but Microsoft Windows Vista is still couple of months away and Adobe is anyway not going to sit idle during this time. Lot of activity is already happening in Adobeplex - they just announced Acrobat 3D, LightRoom and Adobe CS Production Studio.
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Actually, it has a lot to do with the reputation of MS.
MS is known for not respecting standards, monopolistic and producing buggy and substandard software.
I will stand with PDF.
Though it may be a start from Microsoft it will be a long time out before PDF goes away if it ever does. There are markets that rely on PDF documents and will not simply change to a new standard. For instance, look at the courthouse systems. They require PDF documents for interchanging. This system has been online for a while but is now becoming a standard. They will not simply switch to XPS. No, this new format will cause some headaches but it will not remove the PDF standard.
Speaking of buggy and substandard software, the Adobe viewer has been bug riddled since version 7 and causes intermittent machine crashes on shutdown or logoff on Windows boxes, not to mention the overhead of processes constantly running in the background and the uninstaller leaving behind many remnants after uninstall. As for monopolistic practices, take a look at adobe's draconian licensing (and pricing) terms for trying to produce any kind of document on a server. The quality of Adobe reader software has been fading, and they are far overpriced on the document production side. It will be nice to see them get some competition.
Fascinating article which basically tells us very little about what XLS is or does. I am left wondering: Does it make smaller files, that read better on screen, are faster, allow contiguous selection of text, provide collaboration, markups, includes multi-media, costs less/nothing, is a smaller footprint on HDs and DLs, requires less resources computationally or memory, is more portable, fit more devices? or any of hundreds of questions that could have been usefully asked.
We're into PDF... with a but! Adobe is so bloated that it doesn't pass the sink test. Foxit produces a much better, much faster and much more desirable reader and it has - get this - about 3 megs instead of 30. Ditto with its PDF creater software. We have no interest in Foxit. It may take a long while, but XPS will give PDF a run for its money because PDF is so inflexible - its strength but also its weakness.
PDF is not, of course, an industry standard in the same sense as XML. It is a proprietary technology of the Adobe Corporation. What XPS does, is attempt to replace a proprietary technology with one that is based upon the XML standard. If it were any other company's idea, the same people who dis it now would be singin' its praises. I favor innovation, and I don't give a tinker's damn who brings it to the market.
Conspiracy theorist get typing:
I'm running Vista 64 bit, with Firefox as my default browser. I can't use the xps viewer unless I set IE to be my default browser! Only alternative is to open xps directly in IE.
Printing the same document with 30 pages of tables containing plain text, the size of the pdf file came to 337 kb and the xps file 575 kb. I'll stick with pdf.
Adobe PDF *is* a standard as well even though it is not written in a standard language like XML. It is an open standard and anyone can implement it. XPS however is neither open nro a standard.
I read the article which describes the differences of XPS and PDF and I see "One of the key things about Metro is the use of it within the print subsystem on Windows. There are number of issues and limitations you have to face printing on Windows... There are a number of real issues that Metro solves on the print side that PDF doesn't solve."
Sorting out limitiations of the Windows printing subsystem is seen as an advantage to XPS???!!
Surely that only ties it even closer to Windows? How can such a system *ever* hope to be the cross-platform de-facto standard that PDF has become.
On another note, there are plenty of low-cost (some free) printer drivers which produce PDF format documents. I can't see Microsoft ever letting other people muscle-in on its "baby"...
PDF is a proprietary technology of the Adobe Corporation. However so is XPS a proprietary technology of Microsoft, a declared monopolist. I'll be sticking with PDF till something better is developed.
Remember wma who uses wma before than mp3.
who ususes xps before pdf
What was the point for Microsoft? PDF is set in concrete, as far as everyone is concerned. Adobe makes a fine authoring product for the advanced user, and there are freebies out there for creating basic PDF files. Seems like wasted money for MS.
Who cares what company produces it. The bottom lines is, if it solves a problem then use it. I like PDF format but I also know that the product is buggy as is Windows, Linux and OSX. In my situation it makes sense for us to use this format on our site. We have users that have a problem figuring out how to download the Adobe reader. Yes believe it or not. For this instance it makes sense for us to use it if 83% of our users are using Windows with IE. From my perspective it is about the user not your own personal opinion of the company that makes it. So if it works then great. If not, then we use what does. For me, I like the competition. I would also love it if OSX could be installed on my current computer but that will never happen.
No thanks...I will stay with the tried and trued method of generating printable text without all the DRM BS oozing out the sides..Postscript!
What was the point for Microsoft? Does anyone remember Netscape? I don't mean the irrelevant subsidiary of AOL Time Warner, I mean the software creator of Netscape Navigator, arguably the "Goliath" of the browser wars. Microsoft's business savvy has seemingly always outstripped its technical prowess. This is just another example of MS getting into an area where it is neither major stakeholder, nor technical superior, but because of their deployment within the ubiquitous Windows OS, they will gain converts. I'm a big fan of open source so my preference would be to steer clear of XPS and keep PDF until another option is available.
What was the point for Microsoft? Does anyone remember Netscape? I don't mean the irrelevant subsidiary of AOL Time Warner, I mean the software creator of Netscape Navigator, arguably the "Goliath" of the browser wars. Microsoft's business savvy has seemingly always outstripped its technical prowess. This is just another example of MS getting into an area where it is neither major stakeholder, nor technical superior, but because of their deployment within the ubiquitous Windows OS, they will gain converts. I'm a big fan of open source so my preference would be to steer clear of XPS and keep PDF until another option is available.
I've just had a bad experience with Microsoft Visio in a PowerPoint presentation. I had to try to get this printed in a large size, and found, to my disgust, that I couldn't convert it to PDF successfully - the fonts just went all over the page. However, surprise, surprise, XPS format seems to work. Obviously Microsoft have engineered XPS to deal with the bad habits of their own packages, and may be trying to replace PDF by stealth...
I do development (mostly MS .NET Stuff) but have a little experience in other areas. As much as I don't like being somewhere dependant on MS ofter there solutions tend to provide good results for myself without having to fight with lots of idiosyncrasies.
I have have a bad learning experience with PDF, trying to make things look right printing programatically, and had resorted to third party components simply to get a better object model to work with.
If anything printing to XPS will be (is) available programatically in .NET and I will most likely use it for the simple reason that the object model to do so will be fairly well structured and documented. (I'm not suggesting ALL MS stuff is that way, but the magority is enough for my understanding)
XSL-FO? There's an open standard... Just grab a FOP and spread PDF joy... or has someone made an FO processor spit out an XPS zip?
I recently got a new laptop with Vista and had not installed a PDF-creator or Office suite on my machine yet. I am also a Firefox user, and after much frustration in trying to open the only document type I could create on my new system, I finally figured out that it is not necessary to use IE to view XPS documents. (Whew!)
Search the Microsoft site for the "Microsoft XPS Essentials Pack" - this small program installs a simple standalone viewer. Change your default file associations so that XPS files open with "XPS Viewer EP" and Voila! - it is fast and surprisingly unobtrusive.
If I could only find such nice fixes for the other "Vista" issues I am having ...
I'm looking for a reader which will support either format.
Now in regards to my personal opinion.... Personally I don't see Microsoft making much headway into this market. To little to late. Adobe has been SOLO in this market for ~10 years now. I don't see business process cutting over very soon.
The irony is the MS at first wanted to put a PDF print function into MS Vista, but Adobe threatened to sue. Never mind that there are free and low-cost otehr PDF applications, Adobe didn't want to lose their grip on the "print to PDF market" which they have with Adobe Acrobat.
Won't be long before the basic (non-3D) version of Adobe writer will be free to download.... That's good news for users and bad news for Adobe. Adobe PDF has been a total cash cow for Adobe, same as Photoshop. Polo.
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