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Customers have asked whether Grand Avenue can insert a watermarkwatermarks, timestamptimestamps, or other text into document files or convert files to indicate that the document has been released and, potentially, downloaded from an electronic document control systemfrom Microsoft Office format to PDF.

By design, the Grand Avenue application does not distinguish between file formats and has no ability to modify the contents of document uploaded files. Each file uploaded to Grand Avenue, regardless of whether it is a Microsoft Word document or a SOLIDWORKS drawing, is stored as a neutrally in binary image in the database and always retrieved as an exact copy of the original to ensure format in Grand Avenue. Downloaded files are exact binary copies of the uploaded file to ensure there is no corruption or loss of information.

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Embedding the kind of third-party tools in our software necessary to make direct modifications to customer documents would add significant costs to the software and introduce uncontrollable risks to the testing and validation of each release. Tools that may work when a version of Grand Avenue is first released may stop working with subsequent changes to file formats like Office or Adobe Acrobat, or worse, silently seem to work while introducing unnoticed errors into the documents. Because of those potential risks to customers, Grand Avenue will likely not invest in this area, and customers will either need to manually apply any desired watermarks, or consider whether watermarking documents is necessary in an electronic QMS.