Press Releases



Editorials



Reduce PDF Memory Footprint with NEW Big Faceless Java PDF Library

London, England, 20 February 2008 Big Faceless Organization (BFO) has released version 2.10.1 of their Java PDF Library, featuring vast improvements to speed and memory when reading PDFs.

This latest offering is a bugfix to 2.10, released late last week. The speed improvements can be attributed to a switch from a single to a multi-threaded architecture and use of the java.nio where possible.

"These changes result from problems we were having with a single 500MB PDF file", said CTO Mike Bremford. "The debugging process was taking so long we got fed up and spent two months profiling the library. The end-result is a big improvement for most users, and for certain use-cases like digitally signing large documents the memory footprint can be an order of magnitude smalle".

The new release also boasts the Swing Java PDF Viewer, now localized into a number of languages, including Japanese, Chinese, French, German and Spanish.

Download a free fully functional trial version of the Java PDF Library

View a demonstration of the Java PDF Viewer



BFO PDF Library adds LiveConnect Support

London, England, 31 October 2007 Big Faceless Organization (BFO), have released an update to their Java PDF Library and Java PDF Viewer.

Version 2.8.5 of the PDF Library includes the odd bug fix along with improvements for documents saved with Acrobat Reader Usage Rights. The Library can now read and write PDF documents without damaging these rights. A number of refinements have also been made to the PDF Viewer, which now supports LiveConnect for communication with JavaScript. Memory requirements have also been drastically reduced when displaying PDFs containing very large or high resolution bitmap images. See the PDF Viewer Applet API for more details.

There's also a new release for the Big Faceless Report Generator, primarily to take advantage of the fixes made to the PDF Library, along with some custom filter improvements. The Report Generator is built on version 2.8.5 of the PDF Library and version 1.1.6 of the Graph Library.

Download a free fully functional trial version of the Big Faceless Java PDF Library

For more information on how Big Faceless products can help you improve your business visit BFO - Java PDF software



BFO Update all three Java Reporting Tools for August 2007

London, England, 23 August 2007 Big Faceless Organization (BFO), have rung the changes for August and released new versions of all three of their market leading Java based reporting software products.

PDF Library version 2.8.4 fixes a memory leak (their first in 18 months) occurring when certain multibyte OpenType fonts were used in forms. All customers are encouraged to upgrade. Other improvements relate to PDF/A support and reading certain types of TIFF image. The Report Generator 1.1.37 is built on Version 2.8.4 of the PDF Library, and 1.1.6 of the Graph Library, and has been released to take advantage of these modifications.

BFO have also released version 2.3.2 of the Graph Library which adds enhanced support for labels, image and markers, specifically improved support where they're used on bar series and the ability to make labels hypertext links.

CTO Mike Bremford, says, "Our excellent relationship with customers helps us to spot bugs quicker and add new tailor made features through fast response rates to technical queries and R&D feature requests, as well as running continuous tests on all our products".

Download a free fully functional trial version of the Big Faceless Java PDF Library

For more information on how Big Faceless products can help you improve your business visit BFO - Java PDF software



BFO Provide Multi-lingual Support to United States Institute of Peace

London, England, 27 June 2007 Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components, are delighted to announce the United States Institute of Peace (USIP) have chosen their Java PDF Library to create PDF certificates for their online conflict management courses.

Ronald Cole, a spokesman for USIP said, "We have found the (PDF) Library easy to use, and well supported. Our automated system either can create PDF certificates to be sent via email, or printed on formal certificate paper and mailed to the recipient. These certificates are currently being created in English and Arabic, and will soon be created in Chinese, Farsi, Russian and Spanish."

USIP is an independent, non partisan, national institution established and funded by Congress. Its goals are to help prevent and resolve violent conflicts, promote post-conflict stability and development, and increase peace building capacity, tools, and intellectual capital worldwide.

For more information visit USIP

Download a free fully functional trial version of the Big Faceless Java PDF Library

For more information on how Big Faceless products can help you improve your business visit BFO - Java PDF software



Big Faceless Organization Becomes Carbon Neutral

London, England, 4 June 2007, - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), is proud to announce its exciting new partnership with Co2balance.com, a corporate provider of Voluntary Carbon Offsets, that help minimize the effects of carbon emissions.

Co2balance.com will invest funds in sequestration, (tree planting to you and me), and renewable energy projects on behalf of BFO to help offset their impact on the environment and make their Carbon Footprint that little bit smaller.

CEO Monica Kar says, "Climate change is a global problem. On a personal level and as a global company we feel a responsibility to address it. With the help of Co2balance.com we are demonstrating our commitment to sustainability, setting the standard for other corporate bodies, and hopefully inspiring our customers to become carbon neutral."

With BFO software, the days of offices filled with hard copy documents are no more. PDF conversion and digital signature facilitation has been a catalyst for a significant reduction in printing requirements. E-Filing, is now acceptable even for legal administrative documentation.

For further information on how you can become carbon neutral go to Co2 Balance



BFO Release Version 2 of the Big Faceless Java PDF Viewer

London, England, 23 May 2007, - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), has released version 2.8 of their acclaimed Java PDF Library, featuring a complete redesign of their PDF Viewer package.

The new Viewer is designed around a pluggable architecture allowing it to be easily customized to function as a PDF Viewer or PDF editor. Further extensions can also be written very easily for custom PDF workflows.

CTO Mike Bremford says, "We're very pleased with the design of the new Viewer. The modular architecture means extending the Viewer can be done very easily, which is good for our customers and good for us: we anticipate adding many more features in future releases."

The new release ships with components that enable forms to be completed, digital signatures to be applied or verified and more, as well as allowing the document to be saved - bringing some of Acrobat's form completion features to Java Swing.

The PDF Viewer is available with the Extended Editions of the Java PDF Library and Java Report Generator.

View a demonstration of the Java PDF Viewer

Download free fully functional trial versions of Big Faceless software



BFO Offers You Unrivalled Technical Support

London, England, 30 April 2007, - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), has been busy finding out what you like, what you want and delivering more than you expect. The company carried out extensive qualitative research over the last twelve months, within the client base and among all parties who tested BFO software.

When asked how easy it was to deploy, you said you liked it; building an application using BFO products was relatively hassle free to integrate with your applications and, custom issues were dealt with promptly by the BFO technical support team.

You said you wanted peace of mind over the future costs of software and protection from it spiralling out of control. In response BFO's support contract now entitles you to all new versions of the software free so you never have to pay for a new version again. In addition, standard support terms remain in place; priority response rates, product update notifications, priority for bug fixes and R&D feature requests.

Furthermore, ad hoc Support is also available free of charge to customers testing and evaluating the fully functional "pre-live" demo versions of Big Faceless software.

A spokesman for Abbot Laboratories, the global broad-based health care company, says "Support is the best I have seen in quite sometime. We will continue to use your products, and would recommend them to peers".

Verizon, the US telecommunications giant says "Thank you for your commitment to provide outstanding support to Verizon".

Admios, the Californian based systems integrator says "Support team was excellent. Fast to respond".

For more references visit BFO customer testimonials

For more information on how Big Faceless products can help you improve your business visit BFO - Java PDF software



Improve Document Management with Big Faceless Java PDF Library

London, England, 17 April 2007, - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), has released a new version of their market leading Java PDF Library. Version 2.7.9 is primarily a bugfix release and includes improvements to FDF, XFDF and XFA handling as well as JBIG2 encoding.

The new release includes support for JBIG2 compression via an external encoder, complementing the JBIG2 decompression support added in the last release. This can drastically reduce the size of PDFs containing 1-bit images.

CTO Mike Bremford says, "Documents compressed with JBIG2 will now be considerably smaller than those using regular CCITT encoding. Our tests indicate reduction should be in the region of 50%."

BFO's customers in the legal profession and industries with major requirements for high volume document management will benefit greatly from these modifications. Downloading, sending and storing large documents electronically will no longer be hampered by file size.

For further information please visit JBIG2 image encoding

The Big Faceless Java PDF Library is the smartest Java class library for creating, editing, displaying and printing Acrobat PDF documents. The PDF API is small, fast, easy to use and integrate into your projects, and is completely written in Java.

Download free fully functional trial versions of Big Faceless software

For more information on how Big Faceless products can help you improve your business visit BFO - Java PDF software



Superior Text Extraction with the Big Faceless Java PDF Library and Viewer

London, England, 15 March 2007, - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), has released a new version of their market leading Java PDF Library. Version 2.7.8 provides significant improvements to clients using the PDF Viewer extension to build interactive viewers.

CTO Mike Bremford, says "significant modifications have been made to the PageExtractor class. Text that was previously extracted as individual letters or smaller groups are now being reassembled where possible into longer phrases. Some words had previously been broken up by the PDF structure".

The Java PDF Viewer allows you to extract and index text and images from PDF documents, including integration with Apache Lucene. There's also a SWING component for displaying PDFs, along with the ability to convert PDF to TIFF and PDF document printing including support for annotations.

The PDF Viewer is available as an extension to both the Java PDF Library Extended Edition and Java Report Generator Extended Edition.

Download free fully functional trial versions of Big Faceless software

For more information on how Big Faceless products can help you improve your business go to: BFO - Java PDF software



Big Faceless Organization and Intralinks new Java PDF Library Collaboration

London, England, 21 February 2007, - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components,have released version 2.7.7 of the Big Faceless Java PDF Library.

BFO has been working closely with Intralinks, the World’s leading provider of virtual dataroom services. The BFO technical team have now implemented a number of rendering improvements and fixes for some unusual PDF documents in the latest release of the Java PDF Library. These fixes have come on the back of correspondence with Intralinks and have resulted in increased stability and performance with regard to their deployment.

Intralinks have incorporated the Java PDF Library Extended Edition into their On-Demand Workspaces™ solution, which enables the secure online exchange of sensitive business information across enterprise boundaries.

Kyle Lomeli, an Intralinks spokesman, says, "What appeals to me is Big Faceless' customer support. I was very impressed with the responsiveness of Big Faceless. I always felt [they] had our interests in mind when addressing our concerns."

Download a free fully functional trial version of the Big Faceless Java PDF Library

For more information on how Big Faceless products can help you improve your business visit BFO - Java PDF software



Big Faceless PDF Library Supports Duplex Printing

London, England, 04 January 2007, - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components, have released version 2.7.6 of the Big Faceless PDF Library to coincide with Adobe's introduction of duplex printing in Acrobat 8.0.

The PDF Library can also boast a large speed increase when reading documents - around 25% for large files - as well as numerous bug fixes.

BFO have released new versions of their two other flagship products for 2007, the Big Faceless Report Generator and the Big Faceless Graph Library.

Version 1.1.33 of the Report Generator takes advantage of the new features added to the PDF Library. The Big Faceless Report Generator is the leading Java component for converting XML to PDF documents. It is built with PDF Library 2.7.6, and also Big Faceless Graph Library version 1.1.6.

The Big Faceless Graph Library version 2.3 adds a number of bug fixes and enhancements to the previous edition.

CTO Mike Bremford says, "Additional features have been made for those customers pushing the Graph Library in unusual directions - particularly those making heavy use of multi bar graphs with labels. We're continually being challenged to produce new and more complex graphs by our clients and we're always pleased to oblige them."

Download free fully functional trial versions of Big Faceless software

For more information on how Big Faceless products can help you improve your business visit BFO - Java PDF software



BFO and Hallmark deliver interactive Christmas

London, England, 11th December 2006 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components, are excited to add Venspro, Holland's leading Marketing and PR Consultancy, to their enviable client base.

Venspro purchased the Big Faceless PDF Library Extended Edition, the smartest Java class library for creating, editing, displaying and printing Acrobat PDF documents. The Extended Edition allows users to load and edit existing PDF documents as templates or merge with others, create and edit interactive Forms, or "AcroForm" and digitally sign documents and verify existing digital signatures.

Venspro have created an online personalised greeting card website for market giants Hallmark. Customers create their own online account where they can upload their photos and designs to create their very own high quality paper cards. Once the customer is happy with the result, Hallmark will deliver their newly created cards to them, wherever they are in the world! Users can also set reminders and create an online calendar to keep track of special occasions.

Floris Band, a spokesman for Venspro says, "We made our packing list with the BFO tool [Big Faceless PDF Library], extracting all information from our database wasn't difficult, from a time perspective- time is money, buying BFO was cheaper and faster!" Don't just take our customers word for it. Download a free fully functional trial version of the Big Faceless Java PDF Library and see for yourself how BFO and their team of technical experts can help improve your business.

To view more of our testimonials from the likes of KPMG, Boeing, Siemens and a whole host of others, go to: BFO client references

For more information on Hallmark Greetz, go to Hallmark Greetz



BFO says "Konnichiwa" to Japanese Customers

London, England, 22nd November 2006 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components, are delighted to announce the launch of the Japanese version of the website.

The BFO Japanese website will display when the preferred language is set to Japanese on your web browser. Every page of the BFO site has been meticulously translated into Japanese.

CEO Monica Kar, says "we wanted to demonstrate our loyalty and commitment to business in the Japanese marketplace. Our Japanese client base has increased significantly over the last few years and the time was right to offer language support and aid further expansion."

"Feedback to date has been positive and yes, we are looking to add further languages specifically; other Tiger Economies, Eastern Europe and the Sub Continent."

To download free fully functional trial versions of Big Faceless Software



BFO Support Adobe Signature Certification

London, England, 8th November 2006 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components, have made significant improvements to their Java Class PDF Library. The major development in version 2.7.5 is support for creating and verifying certified documents via FormSignature.get/setCertificationType methods.

The Big Faceless PDF Library is a Java Class Library designed for creating, editing, displaying and printing Acrobat PDF documents. The PDF API is small, fast, easy to use and integrate into your projects, and is completely written in Java.

Implemented in Acrobat 7, certifying signatures allows restrictions to be placed on the types of changes that can be made to a PDF after it has been signed.

CEO Monica Kar says "clients from the legal and finance sectors are already reaping the benefits of these new features. From archiving confidential data through to sharing important documents securely, the BFO PDF Library delivers."

The redesign of the PDF reading process has also resulted in a 10% reduction in time and memory load for reading large documents.

Download a free fully functional trial version of Java PDF Library



BFO Announce World Class Text Extraction for PDF Library

London, England, 19th October 2006 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components, have enhanced the smartest Java class library on the market. Version 2.7.3 of the Big Faceless PDF Library includes heavily reworked font handling, providing enhanced performance to text extraction and PDF rendering in those slightly out of the ordinary documents.

CTO Mike Bremford, says "Font encodings have been completely reworked. Documents without embedded fonts, and those documents where the embedded fonts are non-standard, will all render accurately with this release."

Other font-related changes will benefit users in China, Japan and Korea, where the improved support for non-Unicode encodings UCS2 or UTF16 will make legacy documents a little easier to deal with.

The upgrade will also benefit users in eastern Europe - where improvements to the standard font classes mean it's now possible to display Polish, Czech, Romanian, Hungarian and other ISO-8859-2 languages without embedding a font, resulting in smaller PDFs.

Download a free fully functional trial version of the Java PDF Library

For more information on how Big Faceless products can help you improve your business visit BFO - Java PDF software



Render Reports Rapidly with BFO

London, England, 21 September 2006 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components, are delighted to announce the simultaneous release of updated editions of the Big Faceless Report Generator 1.1.32 and Big Faceless PDF Library 2.7.2.

Version 1.1.32 of the Report Generator provides significant improvements to the speed of text rendering. Text rendering will now be between 5% and 10% faster! The Report Generator is built on BFO's PDF and Graph Libraries, and benefits from Version 2.7.2 enhanced support for XFA, including XFA barcode fields, and many bugfixes and improvements while rendering.

BFO's technical team are dedicated to providing their customers with the best java class software on the market. By regularly consulting with existing customers, BFO help clients to tailor software to fit their needs. The latest functionality improvements came about as a result of intensive testing over many hundreds of PDFs which have resulted in several bug fix improvements for these acclaimed software packages.

To take advantage of BFO's dedication and try a free fully functional trial version of Big Faceless Software



Publishers Replace Adobe InDesign with BFO

London, England, 11 September 2006 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components, are pleased to announce the adoption of their PDF Library and Viewer software by Aftenposten, Norway's leading English language newspaper.

Geir Arnesen, a spokesman for Aftenposten declared "We are planning to use the PDF Library as a replacement for a product we use today for producing Ads in our newspaper. Great Product [BFO]!! The product we are going to replace is a "heavy" application running in a Microsoft environment based on Adobe InDesign."

"We will have one server producing the ads which will be accessed by other in-house servers through webservices."

The PDF Library Extended Edition is a sophisticated tool that can be adapted for professional layout and design pre flight with the addition of the BFO Viewer.

To test how these products may save your company time and money, download a free fully functional trial version of the PDF Library and PDF Viewer

For more information on how Big Faceless products can help you improve your business visit BFO - Java PDF software

You can find the Aftenposten website at http://www.aftenposten.no/english/



Happy 5th Birthday BFO Report Generator

London, England, 4 September 2006 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components, are proud to announce the upcoming 5th birthday of the Report Generator.

The Report Generator was first launched in October 2001, and has gone on from strength to strength. It is the leading Java component for converting XML to PDF documents. Clients such as Siemens, Boeing, KPMG and Columbia University have all benefited from implementing Big Faceless Organization's flagship product within their organizations.

KPMG say, "I have evaluated a number of big name PDF generators and this, in my opinion, is the best bar none. BFO Report Generator is years ahead of any other product I have evaluated!"

Siemens say, "The Report Generator works solid and fast, our customers are satisfied, we are very satisfied."

The Report Generator is built on the popular Big Faceless PDF Library and Big Faceless Graph Library, adding their excellent attributes to the leading Java reporting tool on the market. An Extended Edition of the Report Generator and PDF Viewer bolt on are also available to maximise the software's functionality.

Download a free fully functional trial version of the Report Generator

For more information on how Big Faceless products can help you improve your business visit BFO - Java PDF software



Calling all bloggers and Java web sites... become a BFO Affiliate!

London, England, 23 August 2006 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components, are delighted to announce the launch of their affiliate program.

If you own a website or blog you can profit by promoting the Big Faceless product suite; PDF Library, Report Generator and Graph Library. For each completed transaction re-directed from your website you will earn 10% commission. To make your life easier all marketing material is supplied by BFO and is easy to upload. BFO encourages software and technology based sites to join their affiliate program, with Java and PDF related websites most likely to benefit from potential sales.

CEO Monica Kar, says "The objective of our affiliate program is to make a positive difference to the challenges faced by Java developers today, and to raise awareness of how BFO can assist them in meeting their business requirements."

BFO sign, seal and deliver PDFs with new PDF Library release

London, England, 17 August 2006 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components, are delighted to present version 2.7.1 of their famed PDF Library. Documents can now be signed and date-stamped with the PDF Library, and the authenticity of those Documents verified.

CTO Mike Bremford, says "Acrobat 7 added support for Digital Signature timestamps, and now so have we. We've also added the ability to "remotely sign" a PDF via a web service, which means you can keep your precious private key safe on the server where it belongs."

Other highlights include better support for PDF/A to match improvements made in Acrobat 7.07 and even faster PDF to TIFF conversion when using the BFO PDF Viewer.

Download a free fully functional trial version of the PDF Library Extended Edition and PDF Viewer


Free source code for BFO PDF Viewer makes life easier

London, England, 28 July 2006, - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components, are proud to announce the release of version 2.7 of their renowned PDF Library.

The Viewer extension to the PDF library has proved popular since it was released; BFO have now made a significant change in light of customer feedback. CTO Mike Bremford, says "by releasing the source we hope to make the lives of those developing PDF viewing applications much easier". Adding further functionality or customising the look and feel of your viewer is now very straightforward.

The PDF Library v2.7 also includes improvements for those dealing with XFA forms, documents digitally signed by Acrobat 7, and searching a PDF for text. Further, a large number of bug fixes and stability issues have been addressed. As always, this upgrade is free for existing clients.

You can download a free fully functional trial version of the PDF Library Extended Edition and PDF Viewer



BFO's PDF Viewer chosen by ConverSpeech for efficient data mining

London, England, 19 July 2006, - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components, has established an exciting partnership with ConverSpeech, provider of text data mining software to life science institutions.

ConverSpeech have a long standing affiliation with the Human Genome Institute of the National Institute of Health (NIH), where they have helped implement a system that analyzes full-text articles saving academics and curators time finding critical information within NIH's MEDLINE database and other electronic publication sources.

ConverSpeech required software that could translate a PDF file into text for analysis and annotation and generate PDF files from the annotated text. With the deployment of BFO's PDF Library Viewer curators are now able to quickly and easily pinpoint where in an article there is likely evidence for a new scientific claim about a gene's function.

Colleen E. Crangle, founder of ConverSpeech declared "Big Faceless software allows us to bring efficiency and accuracy to an important scientific activity. Without rendering the results of our analysis within the PDF version of the scientific article, database curators would be forced to read an article and then consult a separate display or printout of sentences extracted, without context, from the article."

Read the ConverSpeech case study. For more information on how Big Faceless products can improve your business visit BFO - Java PDF software



BFO - Free improvements for PDF Library

London, England, 06 July 2006, - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components, have enhanced the industry leading Big Faceless PDF Library.

BFO are delighted to announce the release of version 2.6.11 of their award winning Java class library. This maintenance release offers big improvements when converting PDF documents to TIFF images - the images are now half the size of previous versions, and memory consumption has dropped by up to 75% for some documents. As always this upgrade is free for existing clients.

Download a free fully functional trial version of the PDF Library, Report Generator and Graph Library



BFO and Columbia University have great Chemistry

London, England, 30 May 2006, - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of high quality Java software components, is now working with Columbia University's renowned Chemistry department to help move undergraduate applications into the 21st century.

Columbia University's Department of Chemistry has hosted the National Science Foundation's Research Experience (NSFRE) for undergraduates for 20 years. In that time the application process has gone from a totally paper orientated format to the establishment of online applications.

"Once applicant data is received and stored in a database, we need to publish that data in a printable format," said a spokesperson for Columbia University. "The Big Faceless Report Generator seemed a logical fit with our needs. [It] allows us to print applicant information for acceptance Committee review, and we'll be using the application to generate graphs to analyse the demographic breakdown of our applicants."

"I was recommended the Big Faceless products and found implementing the software straightforward. To date the Big Faceless Report Generator has filled our requirements." said Michael Clayton of Columbia University.

To read a case study on this project visit us at: Case Studies - Columbia University.



BFO e-Filing system saves Attorney Generals office time, energy and money

London, England, 12 May 2006 BFO (Big Faceless Organization) provide a solid solution for the government of British Columbia. Is your business still trying to file documents manually, creating bottlenecks resulting in wasted resources? If it is, you are not alone and there is a 21 century answer: Electronic or E-Filing.

An electronic filing system was successfully implemented by the British Columbia Ministry of the Attorney Generals office to improve workflow and streamline the old manual process. Prior to E-Filing the only way for civil court litigants to file documents was to physically bring the paper documents to court. Once presented to court staff, the documents would be examined for completeness. Documents that were considered acceptable would be stamped (rubber and ink stamps) and signed.

With the introduction of electronic filing, litigants were able to submit PDF documents via the internet. A solution was then required to find electronic versions of the hard copy signing process. The Ministry of Attorney General office uses Oracle Forms and required a complementary Java based library. The Big Faceless PDF Library was the outstanding candidate - chosen for its ability to digitally sign PDF documents and offering speed and flexibility, it neatly replaced the time consuming old set up.

Originally the project required that the visual component of the signature and any stamps would always appear in the same place on each document. As the project progressed the requirements changed and users needed the ability to select the location of the stamps and signatures, this was made possible with the Big Faceless PDF Viewer Extension. "BFO impressed us...the viewer rendered more accurate images than the competitors. Specifically, (BFO), was the only Java library we could find that properly rendered the visual component of digital signatures." said the client.

The integration of the Big Faceless PDF Library and Viewer allowed the Ministry of the Attorney Generals office to develop a custom control which supported signing and stamping within Oracle Forms. The alternative? The users would have been forced to use an awkward, error prone workflow.

To read a case study on this project visit us at: Case Studies - British Columbia Attorney General's Office. For more information on how Big Faceless products can improve your business visit BFO - Java PDF software.



BFO deliver support for new industry standard

London, England, 24 March 2006 - BFO (Big Faceless Organization), a global supplier of java reporting solutions, today announced the release of version 2.6.7 of the Big Faceless PDF Library. Governments demand it. Large organizations need it. BFO delivers it. Version 2.6.7 of the PDF Library adds support for the ISO-19005:2005 standard, commonly known as PDF/A.

The new 2.6.7 release addresses the growing need for long-term archiving of information electronically. Documents can be retrieved and rendered with a consistent and predictable result in the future using the new version of the PDF Library. The need for this standard and functionality continues to grow within international governments and industry segments; including legal systems, libraries, newspapers and a variety of regulated industries.

Currently Adobe Acrobat 7.0 only supports a draft version of this specification and as such BFO are proud to be one of the first PDF vendors to support the full version of this exciting new standard.



Improvements to PDF Library for New Year

London, England, 01 February 2006, - BFO (Big Faceless Organization), a premier provider of java reporting solutions, has started the New Year with improvements to its flagship product, the Big Faceless PDF Library.

BFO has increased support for XML Forms Architecture (XFA) by adding the ability to extract the XFA forms data from a document. Also speed improvements for rendering PDFs containing bitmap images to sRGB, as well as text extraction from PDFs containing bitmap images have been implemented in the latest version of the PDF Library 2.6.6.



Graph Library delivers full web services support

London, England, 20 December 2005 - BFO (Big Faceless Organization), provider of high quality Java software components, has just made developers lives a little easier by adding full web services support to its new Big Faceless Graph Library.

Web services are a generic term for loosely coupled service providers running over HTTP. They allow short-term cooperation between processes running on widely distributed systems, sometimes even in different organizations. The Graph Library 2.1 utilizes this technology by generating graphs from Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) requests. It is expected this new addition will benefit large organizations running mixed .NET and EJB environments through the creation of high quality, consistent looking graphs and charts, as well as small organizations running .NET, for whom a Java component was a poor fit until now.

Further enhancements to version 2.1 of the Graph Library include interactive SVG graphs. Fully interactive or animated vector-based graphs can be created using the same simple JavaScript based approach that was used with interactive graphs created as images.



BFO Promises Freebies and it's not just for Christmas

London, England, 14 November 2005 - BFO (Big Faceless Organization), in an unprecedented move, today confirms that all new versions of its software will be free of charge to clients with support contracts. In addition, it will freeze its current prices for the Big Faceless PDF Library, Report Generator and Graph Library for the next twelve months until November 2006.

An emerging major concern for business is calculating ongoing software costs which often spiral after the initial purchase with the release of new product versions. Companies spend considerable time in development and production and after making this commitment require some indication of what the future holds. BFO's new pricing strategy has been developed to address these issues with a transparent pricing structure. Monica Kar, CEO of Big Faceless Organization says "the adoption of this policy meets the BFO goal to provide clients with unrivalled value that exceeds their expectations."

BFO's current support customers are justly rewarded for their loyalty. They are automatically covered for free new product versions as of today without incurring any additional expenditure. This will continue as long as support coverage is maintained. Clients will continue to receive the full service support that they have come to trust, which includes priority response rates, product update notifications, priority bug fixes and special feature requests. The only change is that clients no longer have to use a crystal ball to determine the true cost of future upgrades and new version releases. With BFO, you can relax because you've got it covered.



BFO adds text extraction to PDF Library

London, England, 27 October 2005 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), a global supplier of java reporting solutions, strengthens the acclaimed Big Faceless PDF Library with the addition of text and image extraction.

The 2.6.2 release adds the ability to extract text and bitmap images from PDF documents, as well as index the PDF using the Apache Lucene search engine. The library extracts and indexes text in Unicode from the form fields, annotations and document metadata as well as the document body, and at roughly 50 pages a second for large documents.

Speed and accuracy of text extraction coupled with the existing features of the PDF Library makes it a wise choice for developers involved in data mining, content management systems and form processing environments. As well as being beneficial in settings that require the ability to search or extract text from large numbers of PDF files.

Text and image extraction requires the Big Faceless PDF Library Extended Edition plus Viewer license, which can be downloaded from BFO's website.



Pre Flight PDF's - New Release from BFO

London, England, 12 October 2005 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO) continues to break new ground in the PDF world with BFO software now able to Pre-flight PDFs to the PDF/X standard. BFO have launched this new feature within the Big Faceless PDF Viewer (Version 2.6.1), which is available as an additional component to company's PDF Library Extended Edition software.

The Big Faceless PDF library now includes the ability to create, verify and repair (if possible) documents to the PDF/X-1a:2001 and 2003 standards commonly used in North America, and the PDF/X-3:2002 and 2003 standards more commonly used in Europe. Documents can now be checked against these standards programmatically prior to being sent for print, and the library will either adapt them to meet the standard or provide a comprehensive list of reasons why this isn't possible.

It is anticipated that this new feature from BFO will be well received. PDF/X an ISO standard is a subset of PDF designed to ensure reliable printing, and is commonly used in the print industry. A free trial of the software is available for immediate download from the BFO web site.



BFO boosts its portfolio with Java PDF Viewer

London, England, 24 August 2005 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), an industry leader in Java software development, are pleased to announce the arrival of an exciting new product from their software house- Big Faceless Java PDF Viewer. The PDF Viewer is a welcome addition to the company's existing portfolio, and will provide programmers with a much needed tool for viewing and printing PDF documents.

In conjunction with BFO's PDF Library the PDF Viewer allows documents to be loaded and displayed in Java using a Swing component. In addition documents may be printed or converted to bitmap formats, using the Java Image API or the TIFF writer supplied with the extension.

The PDF library can now be used for the full lifecycle of a PDF - creation, editing and display. It also opens the door for further features which we are working on adding shortly; these include text extraction, preflighting and more.

The PDF Viewer can be purchased as an extension to the PDF Library Extended with prices starting at $400. A fully functional free trial of the PDF Library and Viewer can be downloaded from BFO's website.



Strong demand on launch of BFO's Graph Library 2

London, England, 5 August 2005 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), a global provider of Java software solutions, are proud to announce the release of Graph Library Version 2. Since the release of the Beta version 6 weeks ago BFO has fielded an extensive number of requests on the product's expected launch.

Version 2 of the Graph Library is the result of 5 years of client requests and a red hot programming team. The JSP Tag Library interface is the shining star of this release, allowing graphs to be created directly from JSP pages without any need to create and load the image from a servlet. Embedding complex graphs is now literally as easy as putting the same data in an HTML table. Javascript can also be used to drill down or provide extra information on the graph, and using it is no more difficult than creating an imagemap in HTML.

For those not using JSP there are plenty of other features. Graphs can be defined in XML using the same syntax as the JSP Tag Library, and the API remains for those who prefer coding directly. Mixing bars, lines and other data on single graphs, plot against multiple axes, plot currencies, dates, and more against logarithmic axes, and render to Flash, SVG or PDF as well as bitmaps. Plus all this is built on the same 3D engine as Version 1, which means every graph can be drawn in full, shaded 3D as well as regular 2D.

Live examples and further information is available online at BFO's new website.



BFO Clients Create Cutting Edge Website

London, England, 4 August 2005 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), the global Java software provider, are delighted to launch their new website today. The site is a reflection of the requirements of clients and the highest website design standards courtesy of UK company Richard P Chapman and Spanish based Revelate.

"We'd like to say a huge thank you to all clients who gave us invaluable feedback and to our very talented design team," said Monica Kar, the company's CEO. "We are very fond of our old website and it has served us well, however, we are always looking for ways to make our clients lives easier and the new site design does this in spectacular fashion."

The project development and construction has taken several months to complete but the results are outstanding. The new BFO site is clean, clear and calm. An intelligent simple structure with fast loading pages that enables users to find the information they desire quickly and easily.



QR Code added to PDF Library

London, England, 25 July 2005 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), provider of worldwide Java software solutions, are delighted to announce the release of version 2.4.3 of their award winning PDF Library. The PDF Library adds support for XFA forms, Acrobat 7 encryption, PDF417 and QR Code barcodes. Phenomenal growth in QR Code technology is being experienced in Japan, and is becoming increasingly popular with both business and consumers on a global level

QR Code or Quick Response Code is a two-dimensional bar code containing detailed information that can be decoded at high speed by hand held scanners and cellular phones with built in cameras. Initially used for manufacturing and logistics to track parts, QR Codes can now be found in a wide variety of industries. More recently, QR Codes are being used by savvy marketing companies on business cards, magazines and documents to include website addresses and details of current promotions.

Users of BFO's powerful PDF Library will be able to create QR Codes for all their documents allowing them to take full advantage of this growth technology. The library now includes full support for encoding Kanji, Kana and English.



BFO releases Graph Library 2.0 BETA

London, England, 14 June 2005 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), global specialists in Java software development, are pleased to announce the release of Big Faceless Graph Library 2.0 Beta. The library is a comprehensive Java package for generating 2D or 3D graphs and charts, and converting the files to images, PDF documents or any other type of output format.

Version 2.0 builds on the foundation of version 1.0, and includes support for almost every feature request BFO has received over the past 5 years. Vast amounts of time and energy are saved with the introduction of an XML and JSP Tag Library interface, which allows developers to create complex graphs with a minimal amount of code. Further enhancements include JavaScript rollovers, combination bar and line charts, multiple axes, SVG output and more, while keeping the same levels of documentation and design that made version 1.0 so popular.

The library is currently available for testing, and BFO encourages those who are interested to download the Beta version. Minor bugs fixes and small changes are expected before the final release, which is anticipated in about 6 weeks.

Download Graph Library 2.0

Technical questions should be sent to support@big.faceless.org



BFO Partners with Business Rules Engine Provider OpenRules, Inc.

London, England, 9 May 2005 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), the leading global provider of Java reporting solutions, announces partnership with OpenRules, Inc., provider of the most popular Open Source Business Rule Engine OpenRules.

OpenRules enables business analysts to work in concert with software developers to create and maintain rules-based web applications with complex business and presentation logic. OpenRules provides an ability to generate complete PDF documents "on the fly" using information entered during web interaction sessions and predefined PDF forms. Integration with BFO PDF library allows OpenRules to present a PDF document generation process as a simple Excel table that maps business objects defined during interaction to fields on a PDF form. Dr. Jacob Feldman, CTO at OpenRules Inc., explains that "after trying several Java APIs for PDF generation, we selected the BFO PDF Library as the most reliable and easy to use PDF API."

OpenRules' users will benefit from additional BFO PDF functionality including multiple digital signature capabilities, creating and editing interactive Acroforms, and the ability to import and edit PDF documents. Users of BFO's PDF Library will also benefit from the integration with OpenRules that allows business analysts to define and automatically fill in dynamic PDF documents using easily defined web interfaces. The integrated OpenRules-BFO PDF solution is available now upon request.

For more information, visit http://openrules.com/docs/man_forms.html

About OpenRules

OpenRules, Inc. is a NJ-based US corporation that develops, supports and provides consulting services around Open Source Business Rule Engine commonly known as OpenRules™.



BFO Introduces Multiple Digital Signature Capability

London, England, 29 April 2005 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), a global provider of Java reporting solutions, delivers significant enhancements to their highly acclaimed PDF Library by adding multiple digital signature functionality.

The Big Faceless PDF Library version 2.4 offers non-technical users the ability to add additional signatures to digitally signed documents without invalidating the original signature. "The inclusion of multiple signature functionality is one of the most popular requests for enhancements we receive," says Mike Bremford, CTO. This feature enables unlimited parties to edit, sign and time stamp documents to authenticate them. Associated parties would only need to peruse the amends rather than the whole document, thus saving time and costs.

"Demand for this functionality is increasing across all industries. This is particularly the case when long distance contract negotiation or design development work is involved," says the CEO, Monica Kar. The new features offer all users speed and flexibility when multiple signatures are required. When integrated with the new 'review' and 'reply' features in Acrobat 6.0, it turns the BFO PDF library into a powerful tool for automating document workflow.



BFO Offers Free Licenses to Academic Institutes

London, England, 12 April 2005 - The global Java reporting software provider, Big Faceless Organization (BFO), announces the launch of their Academic Development Program (ADP) to IT Institutes and Universities worldwide. Technical and business students now have the opportunity to advance their Java developing skills using globally recognized commercial software that is pertinent to today's business world.

Documentation is critical to the trading industry as a document can convey an offer, represent a contract, document a product or service, or provide notification, or the document itself may be the product. According to IDC, the leading global market intelligence and advisory service in the IT and telecommunications industries, dynamic enterprise publishing is the next generation in enterprise document production. Vendors in this rapidly growing, emerging market can take advantage of existing investments in content technologies to address the increasing enterprise requirement to improve communication through the efficient, on-demand generation of customized documents.

"Forecasts are showing a steady rise in demand for commercial software packaged with technical support and product updates", says Monica Kar, CEO of the Big Faceless Organization, "Our Academic Development Program opens the door to programming students who are keen to fast track themselves into the world of commerce."

For an Academic Development Program application form, email sales@bfo.co.uk.



BFO Partners with Security Expert nCipher

London, England, 21 March 2005 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), a global provider of Java software, today, announces its partnership with cryptographic security leader, nCipher. This partnership enables true compatibility between BFO and nCipher products and will help users to implement advanced document security.

The Big Faceless PDF Library now contains a signature handler using nCipher's nShield™ as well as the ability to time-stamp documents with nCipher's Document Sealing Engine (DSE200). Alongside the PDF Library's existing encryption/decryption features it is now possible to create and digitally stamp PDF documents for access only by authorised users. This enables non-technical users to establish when the document was produced, who produced it and whether the document has been tampered with. Such authentication is essential to highly secured organizations as it eradicates suspicion of document's originality, hence time and cost saving. The Big Faceless PDF Library together with nShield™ and DSE200 provide the highest level of cryptographic protection to PDF documents in the Java industry.

"Digital signatures and time stamping validate the integrity of documents." says Mike Bremford, CTO, "There is a growing demand for this facility to determine the authenticity of documents." With clients in worldwide banks, governments, telco and other sectors, such features add to why global customers are choosing BFO components.



Concept™ Benefits from BFO's Report Generator

London, England, 14 March 2005 - Java software developer Big Faceless Organization (BFO) and Configure One expand on a successful partnership by upgrading Configure One's OEM Licensing of the BFO Report Generator to the Extended Edition. Since 2004 the Big Faceless Report Generator has been used by Configure One to dynamically create customer quotes within the Concept™ product configurator.

"Big Faceless is a terrific partner to Configure One" says Mike McDonnell, Configure One's product manager. "It's important to me that the companies we partner with have the same quality standards as we do, and that the software they produce is reliable. Big Faceless authors solid, reliable products and can readily be depended on to deliver first class solutions."

The Concept™ application is widely used for streamlining and automating the pre-manufacturing process as either a stand alone application or integrated into an existing system. The Big Faceless Report Generator is embedded within the Concept™ application under BFO's OEM Licensing program, where partners author applications for distribution that incorporate BFO functionality.

About Configure One

Configure One's Concept™ Product Configurator Software is specifically designed for manufacturing companies who produce products that are highly configurable or are routinely customized to meet the unique needs of the manufacturers' customers.



Open Training Appoints BFO as Technology Provider

London, England, 18 February 2005 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), global supplier of Java reporting solutions, announces its partnership with Open Training in Sweden. Open Training offers modern e-learning solutions to the Scandinavian B2B market.

Using the Extended Edition of the Big Faceless PDF Library, Open Training delivers sophisticated certificate printing within their most prized Learning Management System (LMS), Learngate™. The Extended Edition of the PDF Library offers advanced features such as editing PDF's, digital signatures and interactive forms or "AcroForms".

Learngate™ is designed to provide businesses with the quickest, simplest and most effective method of e-learning. BFO's PDF Library was designed from the ground up with these goals in mind, making the two products natural companions.

About Open Training

Open Training is a leading Swedish e-learning company with head office in Stockholm and branch offices Gothenburg and Västerås. The company, which was founded in 1999, supplies e-learning tools and platforms, custom-made course production and consulting services on modern learning solutions. Among its customers are Scandinavian Airlines, NCC, Pfizer, Ericsson, Kongsberg Aerospace & Defense, Saab Automobile, Volvo Trucks, and the Stockholm Stock Exchange.



BFO Powers Up Wiley's Global Executive Leadership Inventory

London, England - 10 February 2005 - To kick start 2005, Big Faceless Organization (BFO) is proud to announce a licensing arrangement with the global publisher, John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (NYSE:Jwa) (NYSE:JWb). BFO's robust Report Generator is the assigned technology to the report generation in Wiley's Global Executive Leadership Inventory (GELI) Scoring Software.

GELI, published by the Pfeiffer imprint of Wiley, is a 360-degree leadership assessment instrument created by internationally renowned business scholar Manfred F.R. Kets de Vries. This in-depth leadership development tool was designed for coaches, human resource practitioners, and training professionals who are looking to develop leadership programs that improve individual, team, and organizational performance. The 100-item assessment is an ideal tool for multinational organizations that are looking to attract, train, and retain the best and brightest next-generation leaders. BFO's Report Generator component was utilized for the PDF report generation.

"Its great to have our Report Generator chosen for use within GELI" says creator and CTO Mike Bremford. "BFO components have been designed for deployment within a diverse range of environments, suitable for SME's through to large corporations. Using JSP, ASP or similar technology, our clients can easily create dynamic PDF reports."

About John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Founded in 1807, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., provides must-have content and services to customers worldwide. Its core businesses include scientific, technical, and medical journals, encyclopaedias, books, and online products and services; professional and consumer books and subscription services; and educational materials for undergraduate and graduate students and lifelong learners. Wiley has publishing, marketing, and distribution centers in the United States, Canada, Europe, Asia, and Australia. The Company is listed on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbols JWa and JWb.



BFO A Serious Jolt Contender

London, England, 15 February 2005 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), a premier provider of java reporting solutions, has been selected as a finalist in the 15th Annual Jolt Product Excellence and Productivity Awards. These prestigious awards have been presented annually to products that have "jolted" the industry with their significance and made the task of creating software faster, easier and more efficient. BFO's popular PDF Library has been nominated within the Libraries, Frameworks and Components category.

The Big Faceless PDF Library is well known by users worldwide for its simplicity, speed and advanced functionality, and the development team are overjoyed to see their hard work being recognised. "It's great to be up for the software equivalent of the Oscars," says CTO Mike Bremford. "The PDF Library continues to be chosen for many software projects and our customer feedback, I'm pleased to say, is excellent. Our team work hard to keep our library at the top of the market."



BFO Expert Partnership

London, England, 26 January 2005 - Big Faceless Organization (BFO), a Java software house with a global reach, are proud to announce Xperts Inc.'s decision to deploy the Big Faceless PDF Library as a vital component within their groundbreaking web-based Individual Education Plan (IEP.Online) software. This extraordinary software plays a critical role in the education and management of children with special needs, at public schools across the USA.

IEP.Online supports teachers in managing, planning and tracking children with learning difficulties, and the Big Faceless PDF Library Extended Edition will be used to generate the completion of forms such as psychological evaluations which will then be uploaded to the user's server. In the first instance, it is anticipated that 500 users will access each application within 50 organizations. By choosing to embed the Extended Edition of the Big Faceless PDF Library, IEP.Online users will benefit from additional features including, digital signature encryption and interactive AcroForms.

About Xperts, Inc.

Xperts, Inc. is a thirteen year-old company founded by President John Tyler's great-grandson, William Tyler. Headquartered in Richmond, Virginia, Xperts is an Information Technology services company with just over 100 employees. The company is divided into three lines of business. These businesses are: Staff Augmentation, IT Project Development and Integration, and Products. Presently, within the Products division, Xperts delivers IEP.Online and MED.Online to the K-12 market. Over its history, Xperts has become known as a premier IT development and services company. The Xperts client list is filled with Fortune 500 companies from coast to coast. Several patents have been attributed to pioneering solutions developed by Xperts and its customers.



BFO Announces a Global First with Public-Key Encryption

Two words on the lips of Java PDF Developers are speed and security, both of which Big Faceless Organization have enhanced in the latest versions of the Big Faceless PDF Library and the Big Faceless Report Generator.

Version 2.2.5 triumphs with a first in the Java PDF World. BFO now offer the ability to encrypt and decrypt PDF documents using public-key encryption. It's now possible to create PDF documents that can be opened only by a specific user. This is sure to be a welcome feature for users requiring top level security.

In addition BFO's CTO and technical guru, Mike Bremford tells us "Significant improvements in this release include a vastly improved cache system, which allows huge documents to be manipulated without requiring a proportionate amount of memory. As a bonus, reading large documents from disk is about 15% faster than the last release."



BFO Launches PDF Library Version 2

November 2003 - BFO are proud to announce the arrival of the Big Faceless PDF Library Version 2.0. This project has finally been delivered after nine months of intensive labour. The new release of the Java API for creating and editing PDF documents includes a host of new features and covers the enhancements you coveted most: extensible architecture for custom signature and encryption handlers, documents that can be cloned and rearranged, alpha transparency and multibyte fonts. It also includes enhanced internationalization for Acroforms, PDF/X output and seriously reduced memory footprint.

"Version 2 embodies everything we learned during the lifecycle of version 1", said CTO Mike Bremford. "The architecture was stripped down and rebuilt with outstanding results, particularly in terms of cloning and speed - with a little re-factoring, users batch filling forms could see speed increases of 80% and upwards."

Thanks to a series of wrapper classes 99% of version 1 code will run unchanged allowing most users of v1.2 to reap all the benefits of the redesign.



BFO Enhances Product Portfolio

Report Generator 1.1.7, PDF Library 1.2.10, Graph Library 1.1.4
With three robust core products, backed by ongoing research and development, BFO have yet again exceeded expectations in the Java software market. The latest releases of the Report Generator, PDF Library and Graph Library incorporate many new valuable features.

Read about the changes for each product on site:
Report Generator Change Log
PDF Library Change Log
Graph Library Change Log

Feedback from Big Faceless users is extremely positive amongst the diverse clientele, which ranges from small organizations to fortune 100 companies. Marketing Executive, Belinda Jackson cites some of the reasons customers chose to go with BFO products, "We're delighted that clients feel their wish lists are met with; unbelievable ease-of use, clear documentation and outstanding customer service". She added, "Of course, purchasing an off the shelf BFO component very often does result in huge cost and time savings compared to in-house development." Users are encouraged to download the fully functional new trial versions now for free testing and development.



The Big Faceless Organization Adds Acroforms for Java

May 2002 - BFO New Release. Users of the Big Faceless PDF Library, the popular Java API for creating and editing PDF documents, are now able to create and edit AcroForms - PDF's answer to the HTML form. Like HTML, PDF forms can contain text-boxes, radio buttons and can call JavaScript functions, but full support for these features has been lacking for Java developers - until now. "We've had many requests for this feature and are very pleased with the results" , said CTO Mike Bremford. "We spent a lot of time on the API design and it's given us a very powerful tool for creating dynamic documents".

The main focus now is to implement it into the Report Generator, the BFOs flagship product for creating dynamic PDF documents from XML. Marketing Director, Monica Kar added, "the PDF library offered good value before with it's digital signatures and encryption, but with forms in place there's not another Java product out there that can touch it". It remains simple to use, with clear, concise documentation and the "free to use until you go live" license.



BFO Extends the Report Generator

Big Faceless Report Generarator Extended Edition - 1.0.1
January 2002 - New Release. The Big Faceless Report Generator Extended Edition offers a PDF reader for importing and editing functionality. At $1,500, it adds to the feature rich capability of its predecessor...the BFO Java component of choice for creating PDF reports from XML. It remains simple to use, with clear, concise documentation and straightforward licensing. A fully functional free draft version is available on site. Licensing is free for Development and Quality Assurance machines.

To use the package, you will need at least Java 1.2 and a SAX parser installed and running on your system. The package uses no native code, and as it's 100% pure Java it will run easily from EJB's or Servlets on Windows, Unix or any other system running Java 1.2 or greater.



BFO Introduces the Report Generator

25 November 2001 - New Release. The latest addition to the Big Faceless Organization (BFO) stable is the The Big Faceless Report Generator. A robust product with comprehensive documentation and offering excellent value at $925, it could easily become the Java component of choice for creating PDF reports from XML. Using JSP, ASP, XSL or similar, creating dynamic PDF documents direct from a database is now as easy as HTML.

It remains simple to use whilst offering a host of features that include full Unicode support, CSS2 stylesheets, tables, HTML style syntax, hyperlinks, spot and calibrated color, Graphs and Charts, TrueType and Type1 fonts, encryption/password protection, OCR support and Barcodes.

To use the package, you will need at least Java 1.2 and a SAX parser installed and running on your system. The package uses no native code, and as it's 100% pure Java it will run easily from EJB's or Servlets on Windows, Unix or any other system running Java 1.2 or greater.



BFO Adds Support for Multiple Digital Signatures

By Nettie Hartsock
5 May 2005

Big Faceless Organization, a provider of Java reporting solutions, has added multiple digital-signature functionality to its PDF Library Version 2.4.

PDF Library 2.4 now enables users to edit, sign and time stamp documents, digitally authenticating them without invalidating the original signature.

"With this release, our library now allows programmers to create software that performs the signature steps programmatically, rather than having to use Acrobat. The incoming form can be checked for validity, marked with approval, digitally signed and filed, or sent to another company for the same process," said Daniel Wilson, spokesperson for the London-based Big Faceless Organization.

PDF Library is a Java-class library for creating and editing Acrobat PDF documents. With the Extended Edition, users can create or edit interactive PDF Acroforms, digitally sign PDF documents, and import and edit existing PDF documents. PDF Library can be run using EJBs, Servlets or JSPs on Windows, Unix, or any other system running Java 1.2, 1.3 or 1.4.

http://www.pdfzone.com/article2/0,1759,1813334,00.asp



UK Produced Java Code to Help US Education

By Colin Holland
26 January 2005

Xperts, an information technology services company based in Richmond, Virginia, is to deploy the Big Faceless PDF Library as a component within its web-based Individual Education Plan (IEP.Online) software. This software plays a critical role in the education and management of children with special needs, at public schools across the USA.

The Big Faceless Organization is based in London and produces a stable of robust Java components including a graph and PDF Library. The Report Generator converts XML to PDF documents. Using JSP, ASP or similar technology, it is possible to create dynamic PDF reports as quickly and easily as HTML.

IEP.Online supports teachers in managing, planning and tracking children with learning difficulties, and the Big Faceless PDF Library Extended Edition will be used to generate the completion of forms such as psychological evaluations which will then be uploaded to the user's server. By embedding the Extended Edition of the Big Faceless PDF Library, IEP.Online users will benefit from additional features including, digital signature encryption and interactive AcroForms.

http://embedded.com/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=57703949



BFO Releases Big Faceless PDF Library 2.2.5

By Don Fluckinger
August 2004

Big Faceless Organization, a London-based software company that makes software for Java developers, released version 2.2.5 of its PDF Library. The company says that the new version offers public-key encryption for PDFs, as well as speed improvements.

"Significant improvements in this release include a vastly improved cache system, which allows huge documents to be manipulated without requiring a proportionate amount of memory," says BFO's CTO and technical guru, Mike Bremford. "As a bonus, reading large documents from disk is about 15% faster than the last release."

Buyers Guide - PDF Zone