A first upgrade has been published of software that turns HTML into standards-compliant PDF.

The Callas pdfChip 1.1 update adds features identified by early users, especially when handling long, dynamic documents.

Users can control the maximum number of pages in the generated PDF file, making it possible to create single page PDF files in one go instead of one PDF file with many pages.

Since the destination PDF can now be defined in the Javascript code it is possible to start a new PDF whenever needed. Error reporting, specifically for Javascript and when placing barcodes, has also been improved.

The upgrade also allows for passing command-line variables straight to the HTML template, where Javascript can pick it up and use it to shape the resulting PDF file, adding flexibility to PDF publishing. This new feature allows content to be marked using simple CSS and stores information about this content in a JSON (Javascript data) file which can then be used to automatically create a table of contents with page numbers, for example.

Placing of PDF files has also been improved, with pdfChip providing information about PDF files that are placed in the HTML template, such as their trimbox or bleedbox. This can then be used in Javascript to modify the placement.