PDF Tech

How PDF SDK’s UX has improved in the Past Year

by Conor Smith | March 18, 2021

We’ve made some major upgrades to the user experience of PDF SDK in the past year. Tasks that used to require you to write a lot of code have now been integrated into the library to better help you with your development. This piece takes a look at some of these product improvements for Foxit.

Merging PDFs with PDF SDK

Being able to combine multiple PDFs into one file can be key for document workflows in a variety of industries. This is especially true for companies operating in highly regulated sectors that must follow compliance guidelines in order to keep customers safe. It also works great for companies looking to convert all physical documents to single PDFs to declutter and reduce waste.

Combining 2 or more PDFs has been greatly simplified in our SDK through the new Combination class and methods. In the past, it used to require a lot of coding from a developer in order to create the workflow, add sufficient customization for most users and fix issues that might occur. However, now you can do it with just a few lines of code that give you the most amount of control over your project. Insert blank pages, insert or append pages from other files, combine/merge large document collections into a single file (programmatically too!), choose additional properties to keep/discard on the merged files and much more with the combination feature. Check out the article here in our knowledge base to see how easy it is to merge PDFs with our library.

Enhanced Samples

We’ve added dozens of new samples to our packages this year to make our SDK more complete and your job easier. You can now get up and running with our new layout recognition features to accurately perform page layout analysis, image to PDF demo to set page size using an image’s width and height and many more. Take a look at some of the most requested samples below:

  • PDF comparison demo
  • Output preview demo for rendering PDFs with color separation
  • Layout recognition demo
  • Demo for enhanced header and footer feature
  • Enhanced ImagetoPDF demo to set PDF page size using the image’s width and height
  • Added PPT to PDF feature to the office2PDF Demo
  • Qt view demo for Linux C+
  • Sample codes for rendering to Adobe Acrobat DC
  • Enhancement of demo on PDF file optimization with new options
  • New feature demos for image2pdf, watermarks, text search, and graphics objects

Check out our changelog for more samples added.

Simplify your PDF Development Journey

UI Improvements

PDF SDK’s UI for desktop, mobile and web has improved significantly in 2020. In every release in 2020, we made strides to ensure the SDK gave you more features you can control with no additional coding. Form fields were a major focus for the team this year and you now have more options and customization available with our forms, especially when it comes to X. We’ve also simplified annotations when it comes to grouping them together and selecting, giving you and your users better functionality. Below are some of the main UI improvements made in 2020:

  • Complete form field stack
  • New advanced area/distance measurement tool
  • Group and select annotations easily
  • Fill&Sign – easier way to fill files and sign in the same tab
  • Single step Undo/Redo on pencil annotations
  • Touch-screen page flipping

The future of Foxit PDF SDK

We are looking to ramp up our efforts even more so in 2021 to make life easier for developers. Alongside the usual new features coming your way, you can expect less coding and better user experiences as you take on new projects. We have huge improvements to our advanced forms, better API design between API code and UI based functionality, as well as a more consistent user interface design and functionality across platforms. Take a test drive of the latest version of PDF SDK below.