Ubuntu – How to batch convert .doc or .docx to .pdf

To my knowledge there is no application that can do this without some dependency from Libre Office.

However you don't need to install the whole office suite when only performing commandline conversions.

You can try if the tool unoconv meets your needs. It has python and python-uno as a dependency. The latter will also install libreoffice-core as a dependency but not the whole office suite.

OK well, I did some more research and although tohuwawohu's method does work, I found it easier to use a program called pdftoppm to achieve what I wanted done. Since I am pretty much a layperson when it comes to using command line apps, I will do my best to explain how I got this to work for me.

1. Navigate to the folder containing the .pdf you wish to edit and open a terminal there. I did this by using the sample command:

   cd ~/Documents/PDF
   

2. Let's say the file I want to edit is called Sample.pdf What I want to do is use pdftoppm to create image files of each page of the .pdf. Several formats can be chosen (see the man pages link above) but I prefer to use .png. The basic command looks like this:

   pdftoppm -FORMAT FILENAME.pdf PREFIX
   

   or in the example above:

   pdftoppm -png Sample.pdf Sample
   

   This command creates an image file of each page in the same folder as the original .pdf file with names like Sample-01.png, Sample-02.png and so on. I have tried it with the .png and .jpeg extensions successfully. .jpg is apparently not supported.

3. Then I just use Archive Manager by selecting all the newly-created image files, right-clicking, and choosing "Compress" from the context menu. I then choose the archive format I prefer (in this case .cbz or Comic Book Zip) and create the new archive.

4. Now I have a shiny new .cbz file called Sample.cbz which I can then view with my Comix reader!

Hopefully what I have posted above makes enough sense that someone else can learn from it. If I need to change it in any way please let me know.