Adobe Acrobat – Export All PDF Files as Text

adobe-acrobatexportpdf

Question: How do I get Adobe Acrobat Pro DC to export all PDF files in a folder as text files ?

Using the Action Wizard on the Tools menu of Adobe Acrobat Pro DC I was able to create a custom command which allowed me to export (OCR) thousand of images as pdf files. I now want to export those images; which are now searchable as text files. However I cannot seem to find a similar set of tools to do this.

Note: There is an export button that allows me to export files one-at-a-time as a text file but I cannot seem to find something that will allow me to run a command on entire folder.

EDIT: I called customer support and a possible work around is to combine all the files into one giant PDF file and then export the pdf file. On the other hand I need a separate ID for each pdf file exported as text so that is not an option.

Best Answer

You may use PowerShell combined with Xpdf.

Xpdf will install a program called pdftotext, which can be invoked from a PowerShell script such as:

$FILES= ls *.pdf
foreach ($f in $FILES) {
    & "C:\Program Files\xpdf\bin32\pdftotext.exe" -enc UTF-8 "$f"
}

A similar batch script can be invoked from a .bat file without using PowerShell:

for /f %%G in ('dir /b') do {
  "C:\Program Files\xpdf\bin32\pdftotext.exe" -enc UTF-8 "%%G"
)

(Note: None of the scripts was tested.)

Here's a simple shell script to do this on the command-line:

Save this as ~/pdf-merge-text.sh (and chmod +x it):

#!/usr/bin/env bash

set -eu

pdf_merge_text() {
    local txtpdf; txtpdf="$1"
    local imgpdf; imgpdf="$2"
    local outpdf; outpdf="${3--}"
    if [ "-" != "${txtpdf}" ] && [ ! -f "${txtpdf}" ]; then echo "error: text PDF does not exist: ${txtpdf}" 1>&2; return 1; fi
    if [ "-" != "${imgpdf}" ] && [ ! -f "${imgpdf}" ]; then echo "error: image PDF does not exist: ${imgpdf}" 1>&2; return 1; fi
    if [ "-" != "${outpdf}" ] && [ -e "${outpdf}" ]; then echo "error: not overwriting existing output file: ${outpdf}" 1>&2; return 1; fi
    (
        local txtonlypdf; txtonlypdf="$(TMPDIR=. mktemp --suffix=.pdf)"
        trap "rm -f -- '${txtonlypdf//'/'\\''}'" EXIT
        gs -o "${txtonlypdf}" -sDEVICE=pdfwrite -dFILTERIMAGE "${txtpdf}"
        pdftk "${txtonlypdf}" multistamp "${imgpdf}" output "${outpdf}"
    )
}

pdf_merge_text "$@"

Now just call it:

~/pdf-merge-text.sh txt.pdf img.pdf out.pdf

The idea is to strip images from the OCR'd PDF, then merge it via the the technique in the answer above.

Pdf – Adobe Acrobat XI Pro: The PDF document contained image masks that were not downsampled

Image masks are often used when applying transparency which Acrobat might not be downsampling due to the risk of causing a visual change to your document. It is possible to flatten transparency (which again may cause an unwanted appearance for the image) using the Preflight tool in Acrobat Pro.

Acrobat XI Pro > Tools > Print Production > Preflight > PDF Fixups > Flatten transparency

I'd suggest trying this to see if the appearance of the images is acceptable to you after doing this as it should reduce the file size. Some common Word processors and similar applications use transparent images when it is not necessary so hopefully that is the case for you.

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Copy pdf text layer to another pdf

Here's a simple shell script to do this on the command-line:

Pdf – Adobe Acrobat XI Pro: The PDF document contained image masks that were not downsampled

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