PAD or Portable Application Description is a machine-readable document format and specification designed by the Association of Software Professionals and introduced in 1998.
The PAD specification is utilized by more than 6,000[1] software publishers of downloadable applications covering the Windows, OS X, and Linux operating systems.
PAD allows software authors to provide standardized product descriptions and specifications to online sources in a standard way, using a simple XML schema that allows webmasters and program librarians to automate new program listings and update existing listings in their catalog.
PAD saves time for both authors and webmasters, while allowing the specification to support the latest changes to operating systems and hardware.
As part of the major upgrade to v4.0, ASP withdrew all its free tools while also formally requesting that all PAD editing, submission and related third-party software, be removed or eliminated.