Edit PDF files and add highlighting and comments

[CoolRat33]

After a very long search, I finally found a full-featured program that allows me to edit PDF files.

Qoppa PDF Editor offers a lot of features including:
- add highlighting,
- add comments,
- crossout-text,
- extract text embedded in the file,
- scan to PDF (can scan and insert directly into a PDF document),
- modify pages,
- add or remove pages from a document,
- add hyperlinks
- and other etc. etc. features

The program is written in JAVA and there are versions for Linux, Mac and Windows so you can use the same program on WinXP and Linux if you are dual booting.

I tested it in my Ubuntu 7.10 and found all its features to be fully compatable with Adobe Acrobat -- when I created highligting or notes in Qoppa PDF Editor and then opened it inside Adobe Acrobat 7, all of the highlighting and notes were intact! Great! Perhaps more researchers and students can switch to Linux now that a good PDF tool that allows highlighting and comments is available!

Check out Qoppa Software at http://www.qoppa.com/psindex.html

[Technophobia]

thanks for the ADVERTISEMENT

and here is another

"
Inkscape 0.46 Released!
March 24, 2008 (Updated April 10, 2008)

The Inkscape community today is announcing the release of the newest version of its open source vector graphics editor. Inkscape 0.46 is a major update that introduces native PDF support. The implementation of PDF support in Inkscape provides an easy, open source solution to editing PDF documents.
"
http://www.inkscape.org/


Sorry to sound like I'm putting you down, but there is always an open source answer.

[fsando]

thanks for the ADVERTISEMENT

Sorry to sound like I'm putting you down, but there is always an open source answer.
I too am sorry if I sound off putting ;) And thanks for the link.

As far as I can see Inkscape does absolutely not fill the gap. PDF studio, from a superficial view appears to be fill a need in linux, commecial or not.

Nice as it is Inkscape lets you import 1 (one) page at a time. And the imported page is meant for graphics editing not reading.

But sure. it's great to see the work being done in this area, and I imagine we're there soon. The pdf-format itself is open and a lot of implementations are trickeling out at the moment. The new Zend-framework lets you import pdf into webapps. Openoffice promises acrobat writer like features for version 3. And now Inkscapes new features.

There are those who are never going to need more than a reasonable pdf-reader (this could basically be any of the existing ones). I believe that's why all those references to apps that are essentially graphics apps but pretty useless as reading aids.

Others (like me, and probably the op), use the pdf-format intensively - 90% of what I read as part of my work is pdf-format. I used to make extensive use of the features in Acrobat Writer as part of my reading (annotation, comments, underlining, coloring etc.).
As of yet nothing remotely equavalent exists in the Linux-OSS world.
What comes closest is kpdf (well, sort of).

[CoolRat33]

I'm a very big fan and supporter of open source software and have converted as many of my friends as possible. Unfortunately, regarding PDF editing tools for researchers who need to add highlighting and comments, I've found nothing better. I can only hope the open source community can provide a solution. I'll be glad to participate.

[wouldya]

Thought it is possible to edit pdfs on open office? Wrong? I always create pdf with open office, thought if I can create it, I can edit it too?

[fsando]

Thought it is possible to edit pdfs on open office? Wrong? I always create pdf with open office, thought if I can create it, I can edit it too?

They say that should be possible in Openoffice 3.

[ahmatti]

Inkscape 0.46 Released!
March 24, 2008 (Updated April 10, 2008)

The Inkscape community today is announcing the release of the newest version of its open source vector graphics editor. Inkscape 0.46 is a major update that introduces native PDF support. The implementation of PDF support in Inkscape provides an easy, open source solution to editing PDF documents.
"
http://www.inkscape.org/



Thanks a lot for the tip! The pdf support works very nicely! Seems like I might finally be able to replace coreldraw!

[beefcurry]

hmm, Scribus, Inkscape, OpenOffice can all export to PDF's fine. Too bad we are still missing a dedicated editor :).

[brunovecchi]

After a very long search, I finally found a full-featured program that allows me to edit PDF files.

Qoppa PDF Editor offers a lot of features including:
- add highlighting,
- add comments,
- crossout-text,
- extract text embedded in the file,
- scan to PDF (can scan and insert directly into a PDF document),
- modify pages,
- add or remove pages from a document,
- add hyperlinks
- and other etc. etc. features

The program is written in JAVA and there are versions for Linux, Mac and Windows so you can use the same program on WinXP and Linux if you are dual booting.

I tested it in my Ubuntu 7.10 and found all its features to be fully compatable with Adobe Acrobat -- when I created highligting or notes in Qoppa PDF Editor and then opened it inside Adobe Acrobat 7, all of the highlighting and notes were intact! Great! Perhaps more researchers and students can switch to Linux now that a good PDF tool that allows highlighting and comments is available!

Check out Qoppa Software at http://www.qoppa.com/psindex.html

As much as I'd like to have a highlighting feature for my pdf viewer, I'm not going to pay for software nor pirate it. Thanks for the shoutout, though.

[jbizcocho]

Others (like me, and probably the op), use the pdf-format intensively - 90% of what I read as part of my work is pdf-format. I used to make extensive use of the features in Acrobat Writer as part of my reading (annotation, comments, underlining, coloring etc.).
As of yet nothing remotely equavalent exists in the Linux-OSS world.
What comes closest is kpdf (well, sort of).[/QUOTE]

I've been waiting for this feature for a while and I simply don't understand why ADOBE doesn't release this. I mean it makes complete sense if the PDF format is the standard for this type of thing, Basic ability to highlight or underline, and add comments should be default.

Anyway I was doing a research paper today and trolling through a sea of PDF's rather pissed that no options are available for Linux (Mac's have one! go figure) and I decided to see how foxit was again. The version I downloaded was their latest windows version, and I ran it using WINE and it worked very well. I know it's kind of sloppy, but according to them, the Linux client only is for Fedora, or Suse I think.... anyway run it in Wine and use the windows version until someone creates it.

[JamesLavin]

I've searched (in vain) several years for an open-source PDF highlighter that runs on Linux.

I'm thrilled to say there is now a (buggy but functional) solution, if you're willing to use KDE/Kubuntu: Okular.

It has some rough edges. Saving files is weird. Saving document XYZ1 as XYZ2 doesn't seem to work, but XYZ1 does seem to save my highlights.

And I don't seem to be able to see my highlights in other PDF readers.

On the plus side, Okular has additional annotation options (that I haven't tried). And it's designed to handle many types of documents (currently in various states of implementation). And the program seems well designed.

Very promising project. And a life-saver for someone like me who wants to highlight 300-page thick Python tutorial PDFs.

--James

[fsando]

Nice to hear and thanks for the tip ;)
Just installed it and it sure looks very promising. It seems to be close to kpdf. It recognizes highlights I made in acrobat writer (just as kpdf does), but highlights made in okular aren't seen in kpdf or evince. Also some of the highlights from acrobat are too far to the right.

Another thing - and I guess this is because I'm in Gnome - it doesn't turn up in any menu, I can't just type 'okular' at the command line and 'whereis' doesn't find it.

turns out the command is:
~/usr/lib/kde4/bin/okular
... or use the right mouse button 'open with' for pdf-files

EDIT:
After further testing:
It seems you can't remove highlights (and other annotations etc.) once made. And not only that. They stay in the document even if you close without saving!

Oh well. Just realized how it's done:
I guess none of the editing is actually saved in the document it is saved in an xml-doc in
/.kde4/share/apps/okular/docdata/
That's why it isn't recognized in other programs.
Remove the corresponding file and all annotations are gone.

[Hei Ku]

You can use KWord, though it actually imports the PDF. You can then save it in PDF or other formats, as you like. I noticed some format shiftings, though.

[stumbleUpon]

You can highlight text, add comments ... etc to PDF files using pdfxchangeviewer.

See this post

http://lglinux.blogspot.com/2008/01/pdf-viewer-with-text-highlighting.html

[tonderai]

Thanks very much for this, it works very well! Far better than pdfedit, anyway.

However, I found that Evince cannot read the block highlighting (it obscures the text), or the post-it notes. But underlining is fine. Acrobat reader can read block highlighting, underlining and the post-it notes, but not text boxes displayed directly on the document.

So, I've moved back to xpdf which reads everything apart from the post-it notes (which I don't plan to use anyway). The interface is slightly cranky, but as a bonus it is very quick :D

This kind of functionality should be a priority for Evince, imho. It would be far simpler to only use one app. Still this will do for now.

[fsando]

You can highlight text, add comments ... etc to PDF files using pdfxchangeviewer.

See this post

http://lglinux.blogspot.com/2008/01/pdf-viewer-with-text-highlighting.html

Tried to run it, but turns out it's a windows exe-file.

I think the short version is that _real_ highlighting for pdf-files is not yet available under Linux :(

We'll just have to keep up our hopes.

[stumbleUpon]

However, I found that Evince cannot read the block highlighting (it obscures the text), or the post-it notes. But underlining is fine.


Yes this is a problem.


Acrobat reader can read block highlighting, underlining and the post-it notes, but not text boxes displayed directly on the document.

Install msttcorefonts. And then install pdfxchangeviewer. Text boxes are then properly displayed in Acrobat Reader.

I think the short version is that _real_ highlighting for pdf-files is not yet available under Linux :(

We'll just have to keep up our hopes.

Yes...there is hope. :)

http://gnupdf.org/

But until that materializes, i would use the FREE pdfxchangeviewer for pdf annotation.

The windows exe runs fine using wine.

[fsando]

Yes...there is hope. :)
http://gnupdf.org/

But until that materializes, i would use the FREE pdfxchangeviewer for pdf annotation.

The windows exe runs fine using wine.

I feel certain that it will come soon. The standard is open so it's a matter of time to get it implemented. Okular has it implemented already but in their own xml-format I guess that it isn't too hard to change that into actual pdf-format.

I'm not a programmer, so ignorance makes everything seem so easy ;). It may actually be quite difficult since it doesn't exist yet.

[lucerodesign]

Thanks for all the tips. I tried most of the suggestions on the list. While all had some level of PDF editing functionality, I'd say a Granny Smiths to Fujis comparison to Acrobat Pro, PDF Studio was the closest.

Being in the architecture/design industry, we edit, mark up, build, comment and annotate large multi-sheet documents. For reorganizing and building spec books with comments and markups, this was more intuitive than the other options.

I did have some JRE issues when installing the application. Qoppa provided very good support and worked with me on it until we got the issues resolved. I'd recommend the application for heavy PDF users.

[Mariane]

Forget Qoppa, the free trial version is useless as it
writes "Demo Version" on each page.

pdfedit is at least open source, but it does not seem to be able to handle tables, and filling in a pdf form is what I wanted to do with it. Or then maybe I didn't spend long enough fiddling with it to discover how to do it...

kword messed up the tables (% signs appeared instead of table cells) but at least it is fully editable.

Mariane

[tacutu]

I read pdf files daily and I often feel the need to underline certain parts.

Okular looks promising but doesn't deliver yet. Plus, the GUI looks terrible. Pdfedit is designed for editing, not for reading + highlighting.

So far, I've had a good experience using foxit under wine -- speed is good, almost as a native app and it has all the features I need. I'm acutally thinking of buying the pro version and get rid of the watermarks (which decently put in a corner, not over the text). And hopefully, one day they'll release a _working_ version for linux.

I hate having to use wine, but it's the only solution I have at the moment. Anyway, with the proper tweaking of the registry, the color theme matches that of ubuntu and you can sometimes forget the app you're running is a windows app.

[fsando]

Yes, it's really quite strange that Linux is so far behind in this field. It may have to do with Linux being 'geek-land' until recently. Ubuntu forum has always been very responsive to user needs but I use other oss products and I'm constantly surprised that, what I consider common use cases are not realized at all by the community - I don't say they won't recognize or that they dismiss it. I'm saying that they are honestly not aware of the problems or don't consider them real problems, just unavoidable inconveniences (for example I just discovered a real simple solution to a 5 year old problem in R that is quite serious for some users, it's asked about regularly and various tedious workarounds are suggested).

Another thing I run into regularly is bash command's inability to handle filenames with spaces. I mean really!! in this day and age!? (Again, regularly asked about and tedious workarounds suggested that may or may not work in your specific situation)

Ocular, Openoffice and the opening up from Adobe I believe will soon result in much improvement on the pdf-front.

[oscar.st]

Hi,

I'm an Linux user too, but I don't know yet a good editor for my PDF files. (Use InkScape is a good option, but not sufficient)

To add notes and select text I find a good option as a web 2.0 tool, BookGoo (www.bookgoo.com) but has many problems yet.

I hope this page are useful for someone.

Greetings.

[ssam]

Another thing I run into regularly is bash command's inability to handle filenames with spaces. I mean really!! in this day and age!? (Again, regularly asked about and tedious workarounds suggested that may or may not work in your specific situation)


either escape the space with a slash, or put quotes around it
eg

cat file\ name.txt
cat "file name.txt"

i cannot think of any simpler way of doing this.

do you know about tab completion? (type the start of a file name and press tab, and bash will finishit for you). it is rare to have to actually type a whole file name.

[fsando]

either escape the space with a slash, or put quotes around it
eg

cat file\ name.txt
cat "file name.txt"

i cannot think of any simpler way of doing this.

do you know about tab completion? (type the start of a file name and press tab, and bash will finishit for you). it is rare to have to actually type a whole file name.

Ohh yeah ;)

I have this frequent problem:
A folder filled with files:
.
..
first text file.txt
second text file.txt
yet another file.txt
....
and finally the last file.txt


I want to concatenate all of them into one file like:
files=$(ls *.txt)
cat $files > all_files.txt
This obviously doesn't work and I haven't found a way yet, and I tried all the different 'quoting-style' options none worked.

On another note (you probably already know) Openoffice 3 is out, with import for pdf-files.

[y0mamma]

fsando, man find

find ~/Documents/ -type f -name *txt -exec cat {} \; > all_files.txt

[fsando]

fsando, man find

find ~/Documents/ -type f -name *txt -exec cat {} \; > all_files.txt

Thanks!
Been looking for that since I started using Ubuntu almost two years ago
Just one slight correction (missing quotes):
find ~/Documents/ -type f -name "*txt" -exec cat {} \; > all_files.txt

[ssam]

Ohh yeah ;)

I have this frequent problem:
A folder filled with files:
.
..
first text file.txt
second text file.txt
yet another file.txt
....
and finally the last file.txt


I want to concatenate all of them into one file like:
files=$(ls *.txt)
cat $files > all_files.txt
This obviously doesn't work and I haven't found a way yet, and I tried all the different 'quoting-style' options none worked.


this works for me
cat *.txt > all_files.txt

[fsando]

this works for me
cat *.txt > all_files.txt

It certainly does! So simple - why did I never try that? :redface:

[ferral-cat]

I use Foxit PDF Editor which is a Windows application but it runs perfectly via WIne. I use it to add text to fill out forms on pdf files. Im pretty sure that it highlights things also.

Widely available on Tow Rent.

[rax_m]

I've been using OSS called xournal (http://xournal.sourceforge.net/).
While not a true PDF editor, it allows addition of text and highlighting of text within a PDF. It basically creates a transparent layer on top of a PDF document that you can scribble on to. You can then export that again as a PDF with all the changes.

HTH

[fuzzyworbles]

the free pdf-xchange viewer under wine solution is perfect! thanks. previously i had been running acrobat pro under a windows guest with virtual box. now i only need to put myself through that burden when people send me docx files (which oo simply mangles)