I have similar tool its name TeX
Spotlight on pdfly, the Swiss Army knife for PDF files
81–90 of 100 posts
Re: Spotlight on pdfly, the Swiss Army knife for PDF files
#82Opinion from 10 years ago, I suspect still valid: There are a million python libraries and tools to do some overlapping subset of the things you'd want to do with a pdf. There are no doubt another million in other languages. These are each basically bundles of some of the transformations you'd want to make to the same underlying data structure. So, complex pdf scripts often need two or three different libraries to ge…
> someone made a great ... in-memory low level pdf reading and writing data structure Are you suggesting Adobe's Core Object Application Programming Interface (COAPI) for PDF isn't sufficient? Kidding! I worked on print production software in the '90s. Stuff like image positioning (eg bookwork), trapping, color separations, etc. Adobe's SDKs, for both PostScript and PDF, were most turrible. For our greenfield product…
"Adobe couldn't decide if PDF was for print control or documents"
Apparently people don't understand the history of PDF. PDF was originally a way to encapsulate PostScript so you could display it on a screen. Unlike PCL, Postscript (and PDF) were device-independent, with a WYSIWYG guarantee. Postscript and PDF are literally the history of WYSIWYG on personal computers and computer-based printing/typesetting.
PDF is not "print control" in the sense of a job control language. PDF has always been about documents, and the features of PDF files can be seen as an attempt by Adobe to both drive and follow the market's evolution of document handling.
PDF is complicated because it's used widely for lots of different things, including printing. And if you've never worked in the printing industry you have no idea how much of a PITA it is.
PDF succeeded for a lot of reasons, but probably the easiest explanation is that they were easier to create - you just printed it and the PDF printer driver spat out a PDF file that you could share everywhere.
Re: Spotlight on pdfly, the Swiss Army knife for PDF files
#83Opinion from 10 years ago, I suspect still valid: There are a million python libraries and tools to do some overlapping subset of the things you'd want to do with a pdf. There are no doubt another million in other languages. These are each basically bundles of some of the transformations you'd want to make to the same underlying data structure. So, complex pdf scripts often need two or three different libraries to ge…
> The ecosystem would be greatly improved if someone made a great (probably rust based) in-memory low level pdf reading and writing data structure.
> Not sure what would economically cause this to happen, but it would be great.
Writing a library that is better than all the others is difficult to begin with. Continuing to upgrade and maintain it and fix bugs is even more difficult. Even with the right funding, you'd have to find someone who wants to keep at it year after year. When they inevitably lose interest, you'd have to find somebody else to take the reins--and weather the storm of complaints during the down time.
In short, thank you for volunteering to write and maintain this library for the rest of your life! :)
Re: Spotlight on pdfly, the Swiss Army knife for PDF files
#84Earlier quoted context omitted.
How do you use qpdf for extraction when its README states “qpdf does not render PDFs or perform text extraction, and it does not contain higher-level interfaces for working with page contents.”
Not the person you're replying to, but when they said "extraction" I believe they're talking about extracting pages from a PDF (like "splitting" the PDF apart, page-wise), not text. At least that's a thing I've used qpdf for in the past.
Which is also what the "extract" button does in Adobe Acrobat Pro DC for Professional Enterprise Customers or whatever they're calling it now, so it's arguably a term of art for PDFs.
Re: Spotlight on pdfly, the Swiss Army knife for PDF files
#85Not the same thing but just want to shoutout https://www.pdfgear.com/ as one of the only viable alternatives to adobe for intermediate level PDF tinkering. It’s free and available for everything except Linux.
> It’s free and available for everything except Linux. I was unable to find the link for OpenVMS, Apple II, and DEC Alpha binaries, could you show me where to find it?
Easy, just run your favorite Windows or Mac VM on any of that hardware and the corresponding PDFgear binary will work out of the box.
Re: Spotlight on pdfly, the Swiss Army knife for PDF files
#86Earlier quoted context omitted.
> This doesn't repudiate anything I said, and it's a particularly weird canard. It does repudiate it, directly. What are you on about?
It doesn't remotely repudiate anything I said, more than saying that Gpvos is the #1 seller of buggy whips ergo ipso facto buggy whips are super popular. This is not a hard logical chain to follow, so good god. But secondly, even that site claimed they have what, a 20% marketshare of multitools from once owning the market entirely to themselves? Even if we were so profoundly simple that we believed that being the big…
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Re: Spotlight on pdfly, the Swiss Army knife for PDF files
#87Earlier quoted context omitted.
> someone made a great ... in-memory low level pdf reading and writing data structure Are you suggesting Adobe's Core Object Application Programming Interface (COAPI) for PDF isn't sufficient? Kidding! I worked on print production software in the '90s. Stuff like image positioning (eg bookwork), trapping, color separations, etc. Adobe's SDKs, for both PostScript and PDF, were most turrible. For our greenfield product…
"Adobe couldn't decide if PDF was for print control or documents" Apparently people don't understand the history of PDF. PDF was originally a way to encapsulate PostScript so you could display it on a screen. Unlike PCL, Postscript (and PDF) were device-independent, with a WYSIWYG guarantee. Postscript and PDF are literally the history of WYSIWYG on personal computers and computer-based printing/typesetting. PDF is n…
One of my first jobs was at an isp/web/cohost company. We had a big bank of modems for dialup customers, had some customers who terminated isdn with us, a rack of colocation and built websites as well.
The company was partially owned and housed primarily in a print shop, we worked above the press floor and I was sometimes pressed into service helping when we were slow (I had some experience working in a print shop in highschool (helping with pagemaker and helping to run the big hidleberg), similarly in college.
Nothing like ending your day writing perl cgi scripts and troubleshooting customers damn winsock configurations and then going home and coughing up whatever color was running on the presses that day.
Re: Spotlight on pdfly, the Swiss Army knife for PDF files
#88Earlier quoted context omitted.
Swiss Army knives seem to be as popular as ever. What do you mean, doesn't have a positive connotation? They're great hiking, camping, traveling, in backpacks and bags. What's wrong with it as a knife? It's perfectly sharp. Obviously it's not a full-sized chef's knife , but it will cut your apple or twine or packing tape. It's a multitool. It does lots of things. A tool of "last resort" seems to miss the point -- it'…
Be serious. If someone in 2025 has a pocket multitool, there's about a 1% chance it is red with a white cross on it.
Victorinox makes one of the better ones though theyre just pricey. I like my MXBS.
Re: Spotlight on pdfly, the Swiss Army knife for PDF files
#89I have similar tool its name TeX
Actually pdftex or luatex, but you are completely right, it can load a pdf file and do a lot of things with it.
Re: Spotlight on pdfly, the Swiss Army knife for PDF files
#90Earlier quoted context omitted.
CEOs often need to sign changes to employment terms or options/vesting terms and have hundreds if not thousands of employees. They don't have the time to go through and sign all of those contracts. Its no different than the analog ages where a secretary would go through and stamp all the contracts with the CEOs signature.
Those don’t need certified signatures. They just need pdf stamps.
Just because that's what many people still do doesn't make it sane.