Re: [Fed-Talk] Fed-talk Digest, Vol 10, Issue 183
Re: [Fed-Talk] Fed-talk Digest, Vol 10, Issue 183
- Subject: Re: [Fed-Talk] Fed-talk Digest, Vol 10, Issue 183
- From: Todd Heberlein <email@hidden>
- Date: Thu, 17 Oct 2013 09:53:56 -0700
On Oct 17, 2013, at 5:14 AM, Miller, Timothy J. < email@hidden> wrote: PDF was originally just a simplified version of Postscript. Postscript is a full-fledged programming language, and malicious Postscript is known in the wild (most commonly used to attack printers and printer drivers).
I used to write "programs" directly in PostScript, mainly just to draw figures (not malware, honest:)
And of course NeXT's display engine was Display Postscript. (They ripped it out before Mac OS X was released (rumors were that it was a licensing issue with Adobe)). Then Adobe *added the programming language features back*. Much fun has since ensued.
I did not know that. :) I'll have to reexamine the specs. FWIW, Postscript is classified Cat 2 Mobile Code under DoDI 8552.01, while PDF was Cat 3. Since 2011 PDF is classed as Cat 2. This categorization is based on analysis of the PDF specification, not the implantation of any particular PDF renderer.
PDF/A could probably still be considered Cat 3, but it's probably not safe to try to make fine-grained distinctions within the PDF specs. How many people can tell PDF from PDF/A from PDF/X?
Interesting. I was an expert witness on a couple of patent cases, and defining "claim terms" is an incredibly important yet incredibly fuzzy process. For example, distinguishing between analyzing a "document" versus "executable code" can be be important when determining if something counts as prior art to invalidate a patent (looking backwards in time) or infringe on the patent (looking forward in time).
At one point I was describing how a Postscript "document" could be considered a "program". Having those government classifications would have been very valuable to me at the time.
Todd |
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