With Creative Suite 4 Adobe adds some more trees to the document exchange format jungle:

Next to Mars (aka PDFXML), XHTML, (tagged) text, ePub, InDesign Interchange format (INX), XML, the new XFL for exchange with Adobe Flash CS4 Professional etc. Adobe introduces the InDesign Markup Language (IDML) document with InDesign CS4.

Adobe says:

“IDML is an open, XML-based file format that enables third-party developers and systems integrators to programmatically create, modify, and deconstruct InDesign documents outside the context of InDesign. IDML works with standard XML editing tools, making it easy to use in automated workflows.”

Links

Adobe

• Adobe InDesign CS4: “Automated publishing with XML, IDML and scripting”
• Adobe InDesign CS4 Help: “Save an InDesign Markup (IDML) document”
• Tim Cole’s InDesign Back Channel: “The Most Important New Feature”
• Adobe InDesign CS4 Products SDK (for single document downloads choose “DOCUMENTATION” tab)
  
• Adobe InDesign CS4 IDML ReadMe [PDF]
  
• Adobe InDesign CS4 IDML Language Specification [PDF]
• Adobe InDesign CS4 IDML Cookbook [PDF]
• Adobe InDesign CS4 IDML Schema [ZIP]

Others

• InDesign Talk: “IDML (was Re: A look at CS4)”
• ulrich-media: “IDML (InDesign Markup Language)” [MOV; German] from Spezialseite «Ankündigung Adobe Creative Suite 4» [German]
• CREATE OR DIE: “IDML: XML-Abbild des Dokuments” [German]

“Happy” converting! ;-)

Comments

1. UPDATE

   Tim Cole—Senior InDesign Evangelist at Adobe Systems, Inc.—blogs about IDML: Tim Cole’s InDesign Back Channel: “The Most Important New Feature”

   — Frank Spangenberg at October 15, 2008 [#]

2. UPDATE

   InDesign CS4 SDK and IDML specification are available:
   http://www.adobe.com/devnet/indesign/

   — Frank Spangenberg at October 16, 2008 [#]