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Editorial Team
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Asked: 2026-05-24T06:09:50+00:00

I’m working on a project that involves the Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac Uniform Appraisal Dataset.

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I’m working on a project that involves the Fannie Mae/Freddie Mac Uniform Appraisal Dataset. The specification requires that the embedded appraisal PDF file be first-generation.

I understand conceptually what a first-generation PDF file is (printing of a document directly to PDF, rather than a scanned copy or printed and scanned copy). However, I’ve done some research and haven’t found anything that specifies the properties of a first-generation PDF that could be verified programmatically.

I found a product that allows one to check if a PDF contains text, images, or both: Apose.Pdf.Kit for .NET, but I’m looking for a way to program this myself, for budgetary and other reasons. Also, I’m not sure that determining that the file contains text will be sufficient to verify that it’s first-generation.

Given that this is an industry requirement of a very large industry, I feel like someone must have already tackled this issue, but I’m having a hard time finding anything.

Thanks in advance for any help.

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1 Answer

  1. Editorial Team

    There is no way to know for certain if a PDF is “first generation”. Technically, a scanned PDF is just a PDF that contains images and perhaps OCR’ed text on top of that. A “first generation” PDF could easily have the same characteristics, so you have to use some heuristics.

    For example, a PDF that contains only images and invisible text (from OCR) is likely to be scanned, a PDF that has visible text or vector graphics is probably “first generation” (OCR for scanned PDFs works by overlaying invisible text on top of the original image, so that text selection works, but the original document’s fidelity is preserved).

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