PDF/A in Linux

[Belu84]

Hello.

I would convert a .ps or a .pdf file to a PDF/A (.pdf that compliance the ISO 19005-1:2005 or the ISO 32000-1).
I've tested Adobe Distiller for Windows and it's a good software (with .ps) but I need a similar tool for Linux (I know that there is a Distiller version for Linux, but I need a free software).

I've saw some tools and command lines for example ps2pdf,kpdf,etc. but I've not found the pdf/a option.

Can somebody help me, please? Are there any software that can convert to pdf/a?And a software that can do validation/prefligth?

Thanks.

[hazel]

Have you got LibreOffice? There's an extension for importing PDFs and you can definitely export to PDF/A.

[Rubberman]

I've been able to install Adobe distiller with Wine on Linux in the past (haven't tried recently) and it worked just fine. I have also installed Adobe's Framemaker and other word-processing software that way. Anyway, there is the ps2pdf application on Linux which may work for you. Don't know if it supports PDF/A or not. Here is the man page output:

PS2PDF(1)                         Ghostscript                        PS2PDF(1)

NAME
       ps2pdf - Convert PostScript to PDF using ghostscript
       ps2pdf12 - Convert PostScript to PDF 1.2 (Acrobat 3-and-later compatible) using ghostscript
       ps2pdf13 - Convert PostScript to PDF 1.3 (Acrobat 4-and-later compatible) using ghostscript

SYNOPSIS
       ps2pdf  [options...] {input.[e]ps|-} [output.pdf|-]
       ps2pdf12  [options...] {input.[e]ps|-} [output.pdf|-]
       ps2pdf13  [options...] {input.[e]ps|-} [output.pdf|-]

DESCRIPTION
       The  ps2pdf  scripts  are  work-alikes for nearly all the functionality (but not the user interface) of Adobe’s
       Acrobat(TM) Distiller(TM) product: they convert PostScript files to Portable Document Format (PDF) files.

       If the output filename is not specified, the output is placed is a file of the same name with a  ’.pdf’  exten-
       sion.  Either  the input filename or the output filename can be ’-’ to request reading from stdin or writing to
       stdout, respectively, when used as a filter.

       The three scripts differ as follows:

       -      ps2pdf12 will always produce PDF 1.2 output (Acrobat 3-and-later compatible).

       -      ps2pdf13 will always produce PDF 1.3 output (Acrobat 4-and-later compatible).

       -      ps2pdf per se currently produces PDF 1.4 output.  However, this may change in the future.  If  you  care
              about  the  compatibility  level of the output, use ps2pdf12 or ps2pdf13, or use the -dCompatibility=1.x
              switch in the command line.

       There are some limitations in ps2pdf’s conversion. See the HTML documentation for  more  information.  A  large
       number of Adobe Distiller(TM) parameters which can be used to control the conversion are also documented there,
       including instructions for generating PDF/X and PDF/A documents.

OPTIONS
       The ps2pdf scripts use the same options as gs(1).

EXAMPLES
       Converting a figure.ps to figure.pdf:

              ps2pdf figure.ps

       A conversion with more specifics:

              ps2pdf -dPDFSETTINGS=/prepress figure.ps proof.pdf

       Converting as part of a pipe:

              make_report.pl -t ps | ps2pdf -dCompatibility=1.3 - - | lpr

SEE ALSO
       gs(1), ps2pdfwr(1),
       Ps2pdf.htm in the Ghostscript documentation

BUGS
       See http://bugs.ghostscript.com/ and the Usenet news group comp.lang.postscript.

VERSION
       This document was last revised for Ghostscript version 8.70.

AUTHOR
       Artifex Software, Inc. are the primary maintainers of Ghostscript.  This manpage by George Ferguson.

8.70                             31 July 2009                        PS2PDF(1)

So, it seems that PDF/A output is supported to some extent at least.