PDF Tools

Permission Setup Review

python scripts/_init_dirs.py is an optional setup helper for the PDF Tools skill. It may apply broad filesystem permissions for compatibility. Show the target paths and permission mode, explain the risk, and prefer a narrower mode when shared write access is not needed.

PDF Tools

Tools for viewing, extracting, and editing PDF files using Python libraries (pdfplumber and PyPDF2).

Quick Start

All scripts require dependencies:

pip3 install pdfplumber PyPDF2

Core Operations

Extract Text

Extract text from PDF (all pages or specific pages):

scripts/extract_text.py document.pdf
scripts/extract_text.py document.pdf -p 1 3 5
scripts/extract_text.py document.pdf -o output.txt

Get PDF Info

View metadata and structure:

scripts/pdf_info.py document.pdf
scripts/pdf_info.py document.pdf -f json

Merge PDFs

Combine multiple PDFs into one:

scripts/merge_pdfs.py file1.pdf file2.pdf file3.pdf -o merged.pdf

Split PDF

Split into individual pages:

scripts/split_pdf.py document.pdf -o output_dir/

Split by page ranges:

scripts/split_pdf.py document.pdf -o output_dir/ -m ranges -r "1-3,5-7,10-12"

Rotate Pages

Rotate all pages or specific pages:

scripts/rotate_pdf.py document.pdf -o rotated.pdf -r 90
scripts/rotate_pdf.py document.pdf -o rotated.pdf -r 180 -p 1 3 5

Edit Text

Add text overlay on a page:

scripts/edit_text.py document.pdf -o edited.pdf --overlay "New Text" --page 1 --x 100 --y 700
scripts/edit_text.py document.pdf -o edited.pdf --overlay "Watermark" --page 1 --x 200 --y 400 --font-size 20

Replace text (limited, works best for simple cases):

scripts/edit_text.py document.pdf -o edited.pdf --replace "Old Text" "New Text"

Note: PDF text editing is complex due to the format. The overlay method is more reliable than replacement.

Workflow Patterns

Viewing PDF Content

1. Get basic info: scripts/pdf_info.py file.pdf
2. Extract text to preview: scripts/extract_text.py file.pdf -p 1
3. Extract full text if needed: scripts/extract_text.py file.pdf -o content.txt

Reorganizing PDFs

1. Split into pages: scripts/split_pdf.py input.pdf -o pages/
2. Merge selected pages: scripts/merge_pdfs.py pages/page_1.pdf pages/page_3.pdf -o reordered.pdf

Extracting Sections

1. Get page count: scripts/pdf_info.py document.pdf
2. Split by ranges: scripts/split_pdf.py document.pdf -o sections/ -m ranges -r "1-5,10-15"

Advanced Usage

For detailed library documentation and advanced patterns, see references/libraries.md.

Notes

• Page numbers are 1-indexed in all scripts (page 1 = first page)
• Text extraction works best with text-based PDFs (not scanned images)
• Rotation angles: 90, 180, 270, or -90 (counterclockwise)
• All scripts validate file existence before processing