PDF files can include FDF form functions to add interactive features to pages. It comes with an existing implementation for forms objects and handling actions, but also allows these to be replaced or mixed with custom implementations if required.

JPedal is not only able to display interactive FDF forms, but offers some powerful features allowing the user to access this data and control the display.

JPedal started off as a text extraction engine used internally by News International and has grown exponentially from there.

JPedal can extract text or XML content (which can include details of font, size, color,etc). Internally it works with XML which imposes a slight speed penalty but provides a huge amount of flexibility.

Text extraction can be more an art than a science and results can range from perfect to poor, depending on the creation of the PDF and the layout of the content.

PDF files contain images which are then transformed to provide the display. JPedal can access the raw images and also apply the transformations, giving the user lots of options. It can also access OPI metadata which may be included.

The SimpleViewer solution is designed as a general purpose viewer which also showcases the extraction functionality of the JPedal Library.

This is a SWING application - plugins are also available for Eclipse, IDEA and Netbeans

All versions of JPedal provide superior support for a wide range of fonts. Embedded True Type fonts, Type 1 fonts, Type 3 fonts and CID fonts can all be displayed within the JPedal viewer.

Furthermore, JPedal provides sophisticated font substitution routines to handle fonts not installed on the target computer.

Java isn't just for Linux and Windows users. Our lead developer uses a Mac for all his work.

Any Macintosh running OS X Tiger or better can take advantage of JPedal's pdf extraction and viewing capabilities.

The JPedal library includes a number of built-in solutions which we have created to meet client requests or to show the potential of the product. We have showcased some of the examples below.

All the products are included, free to use, under the same license terms as the library - there are no additional costs beyond the JPedal library licensing and support fees.

Each example can be used as a 'shrink wrapped' product in its own right, or as a starting point for a customised application. All the source code for these examples is included in the JPedal examples directory.

The example programs built into the JPedal library are fully documented in the support wiki.

The interactive search function allows you to search either the current page or entire pdf document for occurrences of a word or a phrase.

By clicking the icon, a search box is presented. Type in the word or phrase of interest, click the search button and JPedal will search the pdf.

A list of any matches is displayed in the search box. Double clicking any of these matches will open the page on which the match occurred, with the search term highlighted as illustrated in the graphic to the left.

Java offers a printing solution called Java Printing Services. JPedal supports this using both the Pageable (not 1.3) and Printable interfaces. We recommend the first wherever possible as it is more robust.