But now, using PDFTeX doesn’t compile eps file in the LaTeX document. So I guess now I have to use a package like epstopdf to convert all the eps files to pdf. Am I right?

You mentioned: “although you can do the same thing at the pd2pdf stage if using the traditional DVI route”. I used ps2pdf as I can add many option like embedding the fonts, setting the pdf type to prepress, screen, etc. I read somewhere that using -dUseFlatCompression=true in ps2pdf can compress the resulting pdf document by a factor of half! D you think this is it some kind of equivalence to \pdfobjcompresslevel=2 ? If yes, then I’d prefer to stck to the traditional dvi route with the eps files.

Many thanks again for your kind help.

The key thing to remember here is that pdfTeX (the program) is used by modern TeX installations for both DVI and direct PDF output. The systems are set up so that “latex” calls pdfTeX in DVI mode, while “pdflatex” calls pdfTeX in PDF mode (in both cases with the LaTeX format loaded). The primitives under discussion here only work in direct PDF mode (although you can do the same thing at the pd2pdf stage if using the traditional DVI route).

In WinEdt, there are two typesetting buttons (both for TeX and for LaTeX), one for DVI output and one for direct PDF output. So it’s a question of picking the right button to press!

pdfTeXk, Version 3.1415926-1.40.9 (Web2C 7.5.7)

and then I get a dvi file. To generate the pdf file I go through the tex–dvi–ps–pdf route and it’s Ghostscript which decides the pdf version.

So how do one use pdfTeX to arrive to a pdf without going through a ps to pdf converter like Ghostscript?
I presume that it’s not about dvi2pdf command.

Your help would be highly appreciated?

YC

There are a few different takes on the PDF format that have been formalised as standards. For example, PDF/A has been defined as an archival storage format for digital documents, while things like PDF/X-1 and PDF/X-3 are favoured by some printers. In all cases, the key point about a standard is that it lays down what is (and is not) acceptable to meet it. This of course depends both on the aim of the standard and when it was conceived.

In the case of PDF/A, the standard is a definition based on version 1.4 of the PDF format. So PDF/A is essentially a sub-set of PDF 1.4. Various things that are included in PDF 1.4 are not acceptable in PDF/A, whereas any valid PDF/A file will be a valid PDF version 1.4 file.

Similar considerations apply to PDF/X-1, PDF/X-3 and so on. There are of course newer standards, which are subsets of later versions of the PDF file format. The crucial point about PDF/A is that it is carefully designed and agreed to work well as an archive format. That does not mean other PDFs are going to suddenly fail, just that if you are looking at preserving digital information for the long term (decades) then you need to worry about ensuring you can still read it in many years time.

Joseph

Interesting: I guess that this might be due to the graphics (I’ve not tried any graphic-heavy files). On the other hand, perhaps you are right about font inclusion, which may I suppose be down to how the format handles things.

Joseph

These are both TeX primitives, and need to occur before anything is typeset. So they go in the preamble of LaTeX files, or would go “near the beginning” in a plain TeX file. Something like

\documentclass{article}
\pdfminorversion=5
\pdfobjcompresslevel=2
 ...

Joseph

in the tex file? In the options to hyperref, preamble or body of the tex file?

Sivaram