Re: How to cut/crop a part of a PDF file

[Matthew Krauss <Matthew@Greenberg-Group.com>]

Stefan Monnier wrote:
> > > What tool can I use to extract some part of a pdf file?
> > > In kpdf, I can copy a piece of the PDF image and save it, but it's only
> > > saved as a bitmap, whereas I'd like to keep it in vector form.
> > >       
> > You don't ask much, do you?
> >     
>
> No, indeed.  Mac OS X's `preview' does it out of the box.
>   
Really?  Cool.  Of course, I have to admit OS X is pretty impressive, 
even if it isn't my cup of tea.

Still, I will say that Apple and Adobe get along pretty well, and I 
wouldn't be surprised if they licensed some code from Adobe for the 
purpose -- not something that can be expected in the FLOSS world.
>   
> > <theory>
> > AFAIK: PDF is not strictly speaking a vector-graphics format.  It is
> > a subset of Postscript, which is actually a programming language for drawing
> > documents.  It is designed for output, not input or editing.  Therefor, it
> > is *very* hard to convert from PDF to a structured document format.
> > </theory>
> >     
>
> Actually, PDF is not a programming language, contrary to Postscript.
> So it's much easier to deal with (and more difficult to introduce viruses
> into it, among other things).
>   
Really?  Can you explain more about this?  I thought PDF was a subset of 
Postscript with some kind of compression and/or encryption applied.  Was 
I mislead?  If so, what is it really?  Is there no relationship between 
the two?
>   
> > What exactly are you trying to extract?
> >     
>
> For example, I have a PDF which contains a poster with (on the side) some
> meta-information about the author, the intended color scheme, the intended
> paper quality, the revision number, the order number, the purpose, the date,
> and I'd like to take the poster part and throw away the rest.
>
>   
> > I assume you aren't trying to get pictures out, but for the benefit of
> > anyone else, I'll mention pdfimages from the package xpdf-utils, which will
> > extract the bitmapped images from a PDF.
> >     
>
> I do want a picture out, but not a bitmap picture.
>   
Right, I can't help there, but see the other replies you've gotten -- 
I'm really glad you asked this question, because I had given up on 
finding anything beyond the tools I mentioned, and now there are at 
least three new tools to look at!

Regards,
Matthew

>   
> > Also from xpdf-utils you can find pdftops -- converting PDF to Postscript is
> > kind of silly, but just maaaaybe you can do what you want with a Postscript.
> >     
>
> I thought about it too, but couldn't find a postscript tool that does it.
>
>   
> > Scribus is probably your best bet for actually importing a PDF in any
> > friendly way -- I think they were at least working on that, not sure if it
> > is really usable
> >     
>
> Hmm... never heard of it.  Looks interesting.  I don't know how to make it
> read PDF, tho.
>
>   
> > Finally, pdftk is described as "an electronic stapler-remover, hole-punch,
> > binder, secret-decoder-ring, and X-Ray-glasses" for PDFs.  Most notably for
> > your question, it will let you split the pages in to separate files.
> >     
>
> Yes, I looked at it, but I want to extract part of a page.
>
>   

>         Stefan
>
>
>