The Problem
Documents travel as PDF. The receiving system must OCR the text and manually re-key the data — slow, error-prone, expensive.
Smart Document Format
One file. Two layers. Zero re-keying. SDF combines PDF and structured JSON so your documents work for both humans and machines.
What is SDF?
SDF (Smart Document Format) is an open standard that solves the PDF data-extraction problem. Every .sdf file is a ZIP archive containing a human-readable PDF and a machine-readable JSON — no OCR, no manual re-entry.
The Solution
SDF bundles the structured JSON alongside the PDF. The receiving system reads data.json directly — zero extraction cost, zero errors.
Backward Compatible
Any PDF viewer opens the visual layer. SDF-unaware systems see a normal PDF. SDF-aware systems get the data too.
Start Building
Quickstart Produce your first .sdf file in 5 minutes.
sdf-kit — TypeScript The reference TypeScript implementation. Producer, reader, validator, signer.
Python SDK Full-featured Python implementation on PyPI.
SDF Server Self-hosted REST server with queue, S3 storage, and ERP connectors.
Products
SDF — Smart Document Format
The open document format and its ecosystem: SDK, CLI, schema registry, server, integrations, and tooling. This is what you’re reading about now.
More products coming
Etapsky is actively building additional developer tools. More products will be documented here as they reach public availability.
Ecosystem
| Package | Version | Registry | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
@etapsky/sdf-kit | 0.2.2 | npm | Core TypeScript SDK |
@etapsky/sdf-cli | 0.3.2 | npm · Homebrew · Binary | Command-line tool |
@etapsky/sdf-schema-registry | 0.1.1 | npm | Schema versioning and migration |
@etapsky/sdf-server-core | 0.1.6 | npm | Self-hosted server framework |
@etapsky/cloud-sdk | 0.1.0 | npm | api.etapsky.com client |
etapsky-sdf | 0.1.1 | PyPI | Python SDK |