MuPDF

MuPDF
Original author(s) Tor Andersson
Developer(s) Artifex Software
Initial release March 31, 2005
Stable release 1.6 / September 30, 2014
Written in C
Operating system Linux, Unix, BSD, Windows, Android, iOS
Type Library
License Affero General Public License
Website mupdf.com

MuPDF is a free and open-source software library written in C that implements a PDF and XPS parsing and rendering engine. It is used primarily to render pages into bitmaps, but also provides support for other operations such as searching and listing the table of contents and hyperlinks.

The focus of MuPDF is on speed, small code size, and high-quality anti-aliased rendering. Since the 1.2 release, MuPDF has optional support for interactive features such as form filling, JavaScript and transitions.[1]

The library ships with a rudimentary X11 and Windows viewer, and a set of command-line tools for batch rendering (pdfdraw), examining the file structure (pdfshow), and rewriting files (pdfclean).

A number of free software applications use MuPDF to render PDF documents, the most notable being Sumatra PDF. It is also available as a package for Debian, Fedora, Archlinux, FreeBSD Ports, and OpenBSD Ports.

Independent parties have ported the library to many platforms, including the Amazon Kindle,[2] HP Touchpad,[3] PlayStation Portable,[4] Wii,[5] and DOS.[6]

History

In 2002 Tor Andersson started work on MuPDF based on the Libart rendering library by Raph Levien. After Artifex Software acquired the MuPDF project, the development focus shifted on writing a new modern graphics library called Fitz. Fitz was originally intended as an R&D project to replace the aging Ghostscript graphics library, but has instead become the rendering engine powering MuPDF.[7]

In 2005, the first version of MuPDF with the new Fitz library was released.

In 2009, Artifex Software filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against Palm, Inc. for violating the GPL when it included MuPDF in webOS,[8] claiming that the GPL only allowed "non-commercial use".[9] Artifex voluntarily dismissed the suit in 2011.[10]

In 2011, support for Microsoft's XPS was added, based on code from the GhostXPS library.[1]

Since the 1.2 release, licensing terms have changed from GNU General Public License to Affero General Public License.[1]

References

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 1.2 http://mupdf.com/news
  2. ↑ http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=76487
  3. ↑ http://forums.precentral.net/webos-development/306036-mupdf-port-webos-touchpad.html
  4. ↑ https://code.google.com/p/ozbookr/
  5. ↑ https://code.google.com/p/wiixplorer/
  6. ↑ http://www.bttr-software.de/forum/forum_entry.php?id=9832
  7. ↑ "fitz-dev mailing list archives". Retrieved November 25, 2011.
  8. ↑ "Artifex files suit against Palm". Retrieved May 3, 2013.
  9. ↑ "Complaint for Copyright Infringement" (PDF). p.4 ¶15, p.6 ¶27. Retrieved May 3, 2013.
  10. ↑ "Notice of Voluntary Dismissal With Prejudice" (PDF). Retrieved May 3, 2013.

External links