I understand the PDF “platform” in document rather than print-stream terms. This bias affected (initially) my appreciation of your point.

As you say, XPS will continue to find applications in the print space (an irony in itself). I’ve always worked with PDF qua document, so to me, the print origins of PDF, and the way that has colored the document “aspect” of the technology, has always been a bit of a mystery to me. “Who are these people fretting over color-space and profiles?”

I should have said, therefore, that in strictly document terms, XPS may indeed sit in the same (broadly speaking) _technical_ category as PDF, but other comparisons seem decidedly premature.

How did your XPS->PDF conversion experience work out?

Ironically Adobe is arguably an early supporter of XPS through it’s support in Acrobat 8 (although only on the Windows platform I believe), and this is a major reason for me wanting to upgrade to the latest Acrobat version! If Adobe don’t count as an independent industry supporter (putting others on one side) I’m not sure who does, although they understandably may not have drawn attention to the fact

Note on my interest - we are involved on printing software technologies both with Adobe and Microsoft technologies, and we expect both to continue to be important in the marketplace. We have worked with PostScript and PDF through multiple versions for years, and for the last few years with XPS too.

By contrast, PDF has been a recognized, published standard for years, lacking (as it were) only the formalism of ISO or other such bodies, with the accompanying strictures on language, and other such technicalities. Sure, Adobe could (and did) change the Reference how and when they liked, but there nonetheless grew an “ecosystem” of developers and implementers around PDF. These people have more than a passing interest in the PDF-ISO process, so we’re likely to see more cooks in the kitchen. Once we get to the first “post Adobe” Reference, that is.