OP-VALIDATE-PDFA: Validate PDF/A conformance

Inspects a submitted PDF's XMP metadata for a pdfaid:conformance value of A or B to determine PDF/A conformance.

Field	Value
Operation ID	OP-VALIDATE-PDFA
Trigger	Client submits POST v1/info/validate/pdfa with PDF bytes
Entry endpoint	POST v1/info/validate/pdfa
Owning component	InfoController.IsPdfa(byte[]) → Syncfusion PDF/A inspection helper
Inputs	Request body: byte[] PDF
Outputs	Bare bool
Failure response	Always returns 200; the implementation catches its own exceptions and returns false

Steps

1. The Syncfusion-based implementation inspects the document's XMP metadata for a pdfaid:conformance value of A or B.

This inspection logic is implemented in PdfApi.SyncFusionCore; see the PdfApi.SyncFusionCore library documentation for the library's full operation and API reference (no single dedicated operation page covers this specific conformance-inspection helper). Its behavior is summarized here only as observed on this request path.

Origin: The XMP-metadata PDF/A conformance inspection described in this step is implemented in PdfApi.SyncFusionCore, not in PdfAPI. See the linked library documentation for further delegated-logic context. 2. If the metadata inspection throws (e.g. malformed or non-PDF input), the implementation catches its own exception and returns false rather than propagating. 3. The bare bool is returned — HTTP 200.

Process flow

The following diagram shows the metadata-inspection and internal-catch sequence.

flowchart TD
    A["POST v1/info/validate/pdfa"] --> B["Inspect XMP metadata<br>for pdfaid conformance"]
    B --> C{"Exception during inspection?"}
    C -->|Yes| D["Caught internally, return false"]
    C -->|No| E["Return conformance result"]
    D --> F["200 OK"]
    E --> F

Transaction and side effects

Aspect	Finding
Unit of work	None
Commit point	Not applicable — no database access
Records written	None
Downstream calls	None
Repeat-call behavior	Read-only; safe to repeat

Logging

Surface	Written content
—	No dedicated logging observed on this path

Error handling

• No error status codes are identified on this path — the implementation catches its own exceptions and returns false.

Related documentation

• API index
• Overview
• Architecture
• Endpoints
• Authentication and authorization
• Dependencies
• Configuration
• Operations and processes
• Business rules
• Data model
• Operational runbook
• Tech debt

Sources

• PdfAPI\Controllers\v1\InfoController.cs
• PdfApi.SyncFusionCore\PdfHelper.cs