PDF Standard Format Conversion

ComPDFKit PDF SDK supports converting PDF documents to various PDF standard formats, including PDF/A (for long-term archiving), PDF/X (for printing), PDF/E (for engineering documents), PDF/UA (for accessibility), and PDF/VT (for variable data printing).

Convert to Standard PDF Format

Use the WriteStandardPDFToFilePath method to convert an existing PDF file to a specified PDF standard format. This method analyzes the content of the existing PDF file and makes a series of modifications to generate a document compliant with the target standard.

During the conversion process, features unsuitable for the target standard (such as encryption, outdated compression schemes, missing fonts, or device-dependent colors) will be replaced with standard-compliant equivalents. Since the conversion process applies only the necessary changes to the source file, minimal information loss occurs.

Method Signature:

public bool WriteStandardPDFToFilePath(
    PDFDocumentType standardType,  // PDF standard type
    String iccFilePath,             // ICC color profile path (optional, leave empty for default)
    String saveFilePath,             // Output file save path
    CPDFUAConfig uaConfig  // PDF/UA configuration (only required for PDF/UA format)
)

Parameters:

Parameter	Type	Description
standardType	PDFDocumentType	Target PDF standard type, containing format, version number, and subtype
iccFilePath	string	ICC color profile path. If the file does not exist, the default configuration file will be automatically selected based on the standard type
saveFilePath	string	Save path for the converted document
uaConfig	CPDFUAConfig	PDF/UA configuration (optional), used to set document title and language

Example - Convert to PDF/A-1a:

CPDFDocument doc1 = new CPDFDocument();
doc1.open("test.pdf");
boolean ok1 = doc1.WriteStandardPDFToFilePath(
        CPDFDocument.PDFDocumentType.PDFTypeA1a,
        "sRGB2014.icc",
        "convpdfa1a.pdf");
doc1.close();

Example - Convert to PDF/UA:

String filePath = "test.pdf";
CPDFDocument document = new CPDFDocument();
document.open(filePath);

CPDFUAConfig ua = new CPDFUAConfig();
ua.title = "document";
ua.language = CPDFUAConfig.UALanguage.cs_CZ;

String iccPath = "sRGB2014.icc";
String outPath = "convpdfUA_config.pdf";

boolean ok = document.WriteStandardPDFToFilePath(
        CPDFDocument.PDFDocumentType.PDFTypeUA1, iccPath, outPath, ua);
document.close();
System.out.println("convertPDFUA with config: " + ok);

Detect PDF Standard Type

Use the GetPDFStandardType method to detect whether a document currently conforms to a PDF standard format.

Method Signature:

public PDFStandardType GetPDFStandardType()

Return Value:

Returns a PDFStandardType struct containing the following fields:

Field	Type	Description
Format	CPDFStandardFormat	PDF standard format (StandardPDF, StandardPDFA, StandardPDFX, etc.)
TypeNum	int	Version number (e.g., TypeNum is 1 for PDF/A-1)
Type	CPDFPartType	Subtype (PDF_a, PDF_b, PDF_u, or None)

Example:

CPDFDocument doc1 = new CPDFDocument();
doc1.open("test.pdf");
CPDFStandardType standardType = document.GetPDFStandardType();
switch (standardType.Format)
{
    case CPDFStandardFormat.StandardPDF:
        System.out.println("common PDF document");
        break;
    case CPDFStandardFormat.StandardPDFA:
        System.out.println("PDF/A-"+standardType.TypeNum + GetPartTypeSuffix(standardType.Type) + "document");
        break;
    case CPDFStandardFormat.StandardPDFX:
    System.out.println("PDF/X-"+standardType.TypeNum + "document");
        break;
    case CPDFStandardFormat.StandardPDFUA:
        System.out.println("PDF/UA-" + standardType.TypeNum + "document");
        break;
    default:
        System.out.println("Other standard format: " + standardType.Format);
        break;
}

// Helper method: get subtype suffix
String GetPartTypeSuffix(CPDFPartType partType)
{
   if (partType == PDFPartType.PDF_a) {
     return "a";
   } else if (partType == PDFPartType.PDF_b) {
     return "b";
   } else if (partType == PDFPartType.PDF_u) {
     return "u";
   } else return "";
}