Multipage PDF editing (2022) - Scribus and open a multipage PDF to create a multipage document that you can modify (e.g. draw black boxes on it) and save a new PDF. In 2023, for basic security, I just used fat pen tool w/Firefox, but have to rasterize afterwards.
Flatten and rasterize a PDF for security to prevent people from removing boxes covering text
- https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/162922/is-there-a-way-to-flatten-a-pdf-image-from-the-command-line
- MEH: ImageMagick - convert -monochrome -density 300 orig.pdf flattened.pdf - Used. Grainy by modern standards, I think it's original fax resolution, but works.
- BETTER:
- convert -density 600 in.pdf -threshold 15% -type bilevel -compress Group4 out.pdf (from support forum, was "fax" trying "Group4")
-- Seems better. fax is the compression algo. Not sure that's ideal. https://imagemagick.org/script/command-line-options.php
-- Suggests Group4 (newer fax codec) - https://stackoverflow.com/questions/23160191/compressing-text-heavy-pdfs-without-ghostscript-and-only-imagemagik-causes-blurr
Passwords - Owner = Can change settings. User = Enter password before can see it. SET BOTH - owner can open PDF as well. (NAPS2 can set both of these and re-save a PDF)
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PDF/X-1a is specifically for prepress. Disables RGB, and other irrelevant/confusing things for press printing.
http://www.prepressure.com/pdf/basics/pdfx-1a
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I have yet to find a good way to edit PDFs (in Windows) using free or open source software.
However, this is my current round-about workaround to editing a pdf to add text and stuff:
1. Convert the PDF to a WMF using GhostScript
2. Import the WMF into OpenOffice's Draw
3. For better results, highlight the WMF object and "break" it
4. Edit as desired
5. Export to PDF, print, or whatever in Draw.
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Also, look at the trial version of Foxit editing software.
Also, see the open source PDF toolkit, http://www.pdflabs.com/tools/pdftk-the-pdf-toolkit/
- GUI and other PDFTK links: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pdftk
- GUI for Windows for PDF toolkit http://www.angusj.com/pdftkb/#pdftkbuilder
And: http://www.tracker-software.com/product/pdf-xchange-viewer - Freemium. Free program claims to let you edit.
I haven't tested this yet... looks good: http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfedit
Ditto: http://www.pdfsam.org/?page_id=42 - supposed to be able to rearrange pages and combine PDF files and more. requires Java. Mind the versions, it seems the visual rotate became a paid feature in version 3, the last free version with it is 2.2.4
Rearranging Pages: Easiest, use Chrome to open file. Print, specify the custompage order. Print to PDF.
Combine 2 PDFs: PDFCreator, use "wait".
Web based tools: iLOVEPDF (haven't tried)
Term for configuring a print job to rotate and page ordering is "imposition" - there are some specialized software packages for this.
tags: pdf