
Core Graphics, Part 1: In the Beginning - WoodenChair
https://www.bignerdranch.com/blog/core-graphics-part-1-in-the-beginning/
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bringtheaction
> It’s commonly said that Quartz is “based on” PDF, and in a sense that’s
> true. PDF (Adobe’s Portable Document Format) is the PostScript drawing model
> without the arbitrary programmability. Quartz was designed that the typical
> use of the API would map very closely to what PDF supports, making the
> creation of PDFs nearly trivial on the platform.

Would making a PDF reader with the Core Graphics API also be nearly trivial
then?

~~~
Someone
Yes.
[https://developer.apple.com/library/content/documentation/Gr...](https://developer.apple.com/library/content/documentation/GraphicsImaging/Conceptual/drawingwithquartz2d/dq_pdf/dq_pdf.html).

I don’t think it is easier because of that mapping, though. The basic drawing
operators are just a tiny part of creating a PDF reader; you also have to
support various PDF features such as password protection, forms support,
embedded JavaScript, etc, and you need a good library for building the GUI.

