Create PDF

Overview

Combine one or more markdown files into a single styled PDF. Pipeline: Markdown → HTML → PDF via a headless browser.

This skill handles concatenation, page breaks, styling, and conversion. It does NOT generate content — use the research skill or other content-generation workflows first, then pipe the resulting markdown files into this skill.

Input

The user provides one of:

• Explicit file paths: /path/to/file1.md /path/to/file2.md ...
• A glob pattern: /path/to/report/*.md
• A directory: /path/to/report/ (all .md files inside, sorted alphabetically)

If no output filename is specified, derive it from the directory name or first file: <name>.pdf in the same directory as the input files.

Workflow

Step 1: Resolve Input Files

Determine the list of markdown files and their order:

• If explicit paths: use as given
• If glob/directory: list and sort alphabetically (files prefixed with 00_ come first naturally)
• Confirm the file list and order with the user if more than 5 files

Step 2: Combine (only if multiple files)

For a single input file, skip this step and pass it directly to the tool in Step 3.

For multiple files, concatenate with page break dividers between them into a single temp markdown:

cat \
  first_file.md \
  <(echo -e '\n\n<div style="page-break-before: always"></div>\n\n---\n\n') \
  second_file.md \
  <(echo -e '\n\n<div style="page-break-before: always"></div>\n\n---\n\n') \
  third_file.md \
  > /tmp/combined.md

For many files, generate the cat command dynamically rather than typing each one.

Step 3: Render to PDF

Invoke the skill tool. Flags:

• --pdf <path> — explicit output PDF path (default: <input_basename>.pdf next to the input)
• --html <path> — explicit intermediate HTML path (default: <input_basename>.html next to the input; kept for inspection/re-printing)

Single-file example:

pal cli skill run create-pdf md-to-html-pdf.mjs /path/to/report.md --pdf /path/to/report.pdf

Multi-file example (after Step 2):

pal cli skill run create-pdf md-to-html-pdf.mjs /tmp/combined.md --pdf /path/to/report.pdf --html /path/to/report.html

The tool writes the self-contained HTML (inline CSS, UTF-8) and the PDF, and prints both paths + sizes on stdout.

Step 4: Verify and Report

ls -lh <output>.pdf

Report the file path and size to the user.

Styling

Default styling (A4, 25mm margins, GitHub-ish look, table-friendly, page-break-aware headings) is baked into the tool. Margins and header/footer are configurable per-render via flags — no source edits needed:

• --margin <css> — page margin on all four sides (default 25mm). E.g. --margin 12mm for a denser one-pager.
• --header <html|file> / --footer <html|file> — running header/footer on every page. The value is either an inline HTML string or a path to an HTML file. Templates may use Playwright's injected classes: pageNumber, totalPages, date, title, url.

pal cli skill run create-pdf md-to-html-pdf.mjs report.md --pdf report.pdf \
  --margin 18mm \
  --header '<div style="font-size:9px;width:100%;text-align:center;color:#888">CONFIDENTIAL</div>' \
  --footer '<div style="font-size:9px;width:100%;text-align:right;padding-right:12mm;color:#888"><span class="pageNumber"></span>/<span class="totalPages"></span></div>'

Header/footer templates need an explicit font-size (Playwright defaults them to 0) and render inside the page margin — widen --margin so they have room. Do NOT also add CSS @page margin-box rules; they duplicate. For deeper changes (fonts, base CSS), edit the css string in tools/md-to-html-pdf.ts (the .mjs is generated from it — never edit the .mjs).

Translation Variant

If the user asks to translate markdown files and then create a PDF:

1. Spawn parallel subagents to translate files — batch 2-4 files per agent, all agents in a single message (skip parallelism when there is only one file; a single coherent translator is faster and more consistent)
2. Each agent reads the source file, translates all text content to the target language, and writes to <original_name>_<lang>.md
3. Rules for translation agents:
   • Keep all markdown formatting, links, and structure identical
   • Keep source/link titles in their original language; translate surrounding text
   • Translate naturally, not word-for-word; use proper domain terminology
4. After all agents complete, run Steps 2-4 above on the translated files
5. Output filename gets a _<lang> suffix (e.g., report_hu.pdf)

Batch sizing for translation agents:

Important

• This skill only converts — it does not research or generate content
• Individual markdown files are preserved alongside the PDF for future editing
• The intermediate HTML is also preserved — open it in a browser to inspect or Print-to-PDF manually
• Always verify the PDF exists before reporting success