The third part of our PDF/A series covers PDF/A-3, which is considered the current standard for archiving and e-invoices. This does not mean that PDF/A-1 or PDF/A-2 are no longer valid. Depending on the use case, older PDF/A formats can still be fully sufficient. PDF viewers are backward-compatible, so PDF/A-1 remains valid even though newer formats exist. Still, PDF/A-3 is currently treated as the standard format.
As already described in the first part of our blog series, PDF/A - The format of the future - Part 1: PDF/A-1, the PDF/A format (A = Archive) is already used very successfully for archiving data.
The Portable Document Format (PDF) established itself many years ago as the medium for sharing documents in a form that works everywhere. With it, electronic versions of documents can be faithfully presented, opened, and printed independent of operating system and software. The author can specify at the outset in what form the document will be rendered visible. PDF eliminates all those problems that previously arose when transmitting documents, such as formatting errors and other issues stemming from the recipient using a different system than that of the sender.