Adobe has announced plans to submit its Portable Document Format specification to the Enterprise Content Management Association (AIIM) with the intent of having the PDF format approved by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) as an open standard. First launched in 1993, the PDF has since become a de facto standard for cross-platform document exchange.
Adobe's decision to submit PDF to AIIM for approval as an open standard may defuse some of whatever momentum XPS (short for XML Paper Specification, is Microsoft's answer to PDF. Microsoft's plans for its "PDF-killer" originally called for including support for XPS within Windows Vista and Office 2007), gains from the imminent release of Vista and Office 2007, as well as Microsoft's decision to submit XPS for approval. Final approval for the PDF standard is expected within one to three years.