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Mac Forum / Programming / Perl / August 2005Editing PDF files?
I'm interested in being able to perform simple edits on PDF files. For example, I might want to be able to change the colors of some characters and output the changed version. If I had the ability to import and export PDF files as Perl data structures (and a reference to what I'd be encountering :-), I'm pretty sure I could do the rest. Looking at the CPAN, I see a number of modules that _might_ be useful for this, but I'm hoping that someone here will know which ones are the most relevant. Help? Clues? Sugestions? -r  Signatureemail: rdm@cfcl.com; phone: +1 650-873-7841 http://www.cfcl.com - Canta Forda Computer Laboratory http://www.cfcl.com/Meta - The FreeBSD Browser, Meta Project, etc. > I'm interested in being able to perform simple edits on PDF files. > For example, I might want to be able to change the colors of some > characters and output the changed version. I looked ad Apple's PDFKit, thinking there might be a solution, but no. Lots of stuff for searching, annotating, and rearranging pages - but no low-level editing functions like you describe. Which makes sense - PDF is really more of a delivery format than an editing format. Do you have control over the source of these PDF documents? If so, you could make your changes there, and maybe use Automator to build up a workflow to create and manage the PDFs. sherm-- Cocoa programming in Perl: http://camelbones.sourceforge.net Hire me! My resume: http://www.dot-app.org >PDF is really more of a delivery format than an editing format. Yeah, but Acrobat now supports mark-up, etc. I have also edited PostScript files in the past, which is the same basic idea. I COULD convert the files to PS in order to edit them, then convert back to PDF. But that's pretty ugly... >Do you have control over the source of these PDF documents? No; I need to deal with random PDFs that I find on the web, etc. -r Signatureemail: rdm@cfcl.com; phone: +1 650-873-7841 http://www.cfcl.com - Canta Forda Computer Laboratory http://www.cfcl.com/Meta - The FreeBSD Browser, Meta Project, etc. You may well find PDF::API2 will do what you want. The downside is the module is huge, complex and sparsely documented. There are however helpful folk to be found at <perl-text-pdf-modules@groups.yahoo.com> and a Twiki at <http://pdfapi2.sourceforge.net/twiki/>. Some scripts there might give you an overview of the capabilities of the module. Alan Fry >> I'm interested in being able to perform simple edits on PDF files. >> For example, I might want to be able to change the colors of some [quoted text clipped - 14 lines] > Cocoa programming in Perl: http://camelbones.sourceforge.net > Hire me! My resume: http://www.dot-app.org I think someone needs to build an editor for PDF files. Maybe macros for emacs or vim. >> I'm interested in being able to perform simple edits on PDF files. >> For example, I might want to be able to change the colors of some [quoted text clipped - 14 lines] > Cocoa programming in Perl: http://camelbones.sourceforge.net > Hire me! My resume: http://www.dot-app.org Hello.. This have been a problem as long as PDF has existed. The PDF format was initially created as a simpler and smaller format than PostScript. It's like PS not a format that was intended to be editable There are some applicarions thought that you might like to try out. The commersial "Solvere" from the german company One Vision You may also try to parse a PDF into Illustrator, but then the structure will be lost Both are pretty expensive solutions and are not very good soulutions but still..... So I could not agree more: Build a simple, small, inexpensive editor... Regards Torkjell Arnzten > I think someone needs to build an editor for PDF files. Maybe macros > for emacs or vim. [quoted text clipped - 17 lines] >> Cocoa programming in Perl: http://camelbones.sourceforge.net >> Hire me! My resume: http://www.dot-app.org |
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