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As such, PDF documents created in Office 12 can contain live hyperlinks and be read by screen readers. PDFs created in the Publisher component of Office will also have support for CMYK colour models and printing page marks.

Note that Office 12 PDFs will not support the security technologies of Adobe's Acrobat PDF creation software such as DRM and password protection. Microsoft has ambitions of its own for its Windows Media DRM system, and is not about to cede territory to a major rival.

Adding PDF support will bring

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the Windows version of Office into line with the Mac version, which exploits OS X's native support for the technology to enable the creation of both PDF and PDF-X files with compression and encryption options.

Steven Sinofsky, Microsoft's Office VP said that the decision to include the format was a response to customer demand. 'The Save As PDF technology represents a direct response to our customers, who have asked for this feature through many channels of customer feedback... We receive requests through our MS Wish customer connection site on Microsoft.com. Requests for PDF functionality in Office represent the number two request when customers interact with our worldwide support organization. Every month we receive over 120,000 queries worldwide for "PDF" through Microsoft Office Online. And of course, our MVPs have expressed strongly their desire to see this functionality integrated with Microsoft Office.'

Office 12 is due to ship in the second half of next year. Sinofsky said that some features remain subject to change.