Creating ZUGFeRD files

ZUGFeRD (also known as Factur-X, XRechnung) files are PDF/A-3 documents that contain both human-readable and machine-readable invoice data, making them suitable for use in e-invoicing. The ZUGFeRD standard, which stands for “Zentraler User Guide des Forums elektronische Rechnung Deutschland,” was developed in Germany to streamline electronic invoicing between businesses (B2B) and with public entities (B2G).

What is ZUGFeRD?

ZUGFeRD is unique because it combines two formats into one invoice:

  • Human-readable PDF/A-3: A visual representation of the invoice, just like a regular PDF.

  • Machine-readable XML: Embedded within the PDF, this XML file contains structured invoice data, which can be automatically processed by accounting software.

By including both formats, ZUGFeRD allows the recipient to either view and print the invoice or process the structured data electronically, eliminating the need for manual data entry.

How to create a ZUGFeRD PDF with Ghostscript

Note

We will assume you have been supplied with, or understand how to make, the XML portion for your invoice.

Ghostscript is just responsible for ensuring that the generated PDF is PDF/A compliant and for embedding the XML - it does not analyse or validate the XML structure.

To create such an e-invoice we can use the zugferd.ps PostScript file (found in the lib folder) along with some command line options as follows:

gs
--permit-file-read=/usr/home/me/zugferd/
-sDEVICE=pdfwrite
-dPDFA=3
-sColorConversionStrategy=RGB
-sZUGFeRDXMLFile=/usr/home/me/zugferd/invoice.xml
-sZUGFeRDProfile=/usr/home/me/zugferd/default_rgb.icc
-sZUGFeRDVersion=2p1
-sZUGFeRDConformanceLevel=BASIC
-o /usr/home/me/zugferd/output.pdf
/usr/home/me/zugferd/zugferd.ps
/usr/home/me/zugferd/input.pdf

Let’s go through these command line options in more detail:

--permit-file-read

Grant access to the folder we allow Ghostscript to read from.

-sDEVICE

Select a device to write a PDF.

-dPDFA

Define the PDF/A version. See: Creating a PDF/A document for available options. Note: version 3 is required for ZUGFeRD!

-sColorConversionStrategy

Define the color conversion strategy. See: Creating a PDF/A document for available options. Note: this should be consistent with the ICC profile defined in -sZUGFeRDProfile. So for example if this value is RGB then the associated ICC profile should be an RGB profile.

-sZUGFeRDXMLFile

Define the path to the invoice XML file.

-sZUGFeRDProfile

Define the path to the ICC profile.

-sZUGFeRDVersion

Allows selection of the version of the ZUGFeRD standard, possible values are rc, 1p0, 2p0, 2p1. The default is 2p1 which is the 2.1 version of ZUGFeRD.

-sZUGFeRDConformanceLevel

Defines the level of conformance with the standard, possible values are MINIMUM, BASIC, BASIC WL, EN 16931, EXTENDED and XRECHNUNG. The default is BASIC.

-o

Defines the output PDF file.

Note

The final two arguments are the full path and filename of the zugferd.ps file, and the full path and filename of the input PDF file respectively.