On 25 July 2012 13:03, Jan Velterop <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> One advantage of a PDF copy versus an MS-Word copy is the fact that it's
> more tamper-proof. There are various ways to deal with PDFs in a repository
> that enhance their value.
Worrying about a file format being tamper-proof is a bit pointless.
All that people can tamper is a copy of the document, not the actual
document that is stored and served by the repository.
There are always ways around tampering with PDFs if that's what you
want to do, and anyone accepting content from an untrusted source
without verifying it is asking for trouble.
A more fundamental benefit of PDF over Word documents is that you
[can] have a more portable and consistent experience across platforms.
Regardless of whether Word is a standard or not, there are more
devices that will read PDFs, and you are more likely to be able to
read the content properly, without the headaches of missing fonts
(although that isn't always true).
Plus, Word files have a habit of tracking information within the
document - like changes - that isn't immediately apparent to you as an
author, but could be mined by someone digging into the internals of
the document. So, if you want to avoid the possibility of accidentally
leaking information, converting to something like a PDF can be a good
idea.
G
|