/paperCrop

Convert multi-column PDF files to single column to be viewed on 6 to 10 inch displays (such as Kindle Scribe).

Primary LanguageCGNU General Public License v2.0GPL-2.0

paperCrop v0.6

Multi-column PDF files on 6 to 10 inch displays.

About

This program converts PDF documents such as articles and academic papers into a PDF (or an image sequence) so that it can be read on a small screen of e-book devices or smartphones. (I developed this program partly because all my ebook devices are limited in their PDF implementation. This tool can optimize any PDFs to work on the readers robustly.)

Usage

Open a PDF file (by clicking Load button, or drag-and-drop)

Choose a preset by clicking the default preset button

Click "Process all pages" button

Output will be in the same folder with the input file. (~1.pdf)

Usage 2 (advanced)

Open a PDF file (by clicking Load button, or drag-and-drop)

(Optional) choose how many columns are in the pdf file, and then click the update button.

if results are not satisfactory, modify the MIN gap and margin parameters, and then click the update button.

(Optional) choose a rendering option by clicking the option button

Process all pages.

Usage 3 (manual segmentation)

Open a PDF file (by clicking Load button, or drag-and-drop)

Uncheck automatic segmentation

Select a region by clicking, delete one by hitting DEL when necessary, or create one by dragging.

Process all pages or Process current page

FAQ

How can I change output aspect ratio? Open config.lua and edit "vector_PDF={600,800,..." appropriately.

How can I create a preset? Copy presets/one-column papers.lua to a new file (e.g. "presets/ACM TOG.lua"), and edit it.

How can I change the default preset Edit presets/default preset.lua. It points to one of the preset files.

The output folder is empty. Why? The output file xxx_1.pdf is in the same folder as the input pdf (if you chose "cancel" on the file saving dialog). Not in the xxx folder.

The following FAQs are irrelevant to the default "vector PDF" device.

How can I change output format? Edit config.lua. Find ".gif" and replace it as .jpg, .bmp or .png. Don't forget to set output_to_pdf=false if desired output format is NOT pdf.

How can I improve readability? Edit config.lua. One can adjust image processing parameters such as sharpen, contrast, gamma, dithering, and color depth.

Output is gray. If you need colors, edit config.lua and set color_depth=8 -> color_depth=24. (From version 0.43) This program is for converting technical documents.

Linux (Ubuntu or some debian distributions)

How to install.

make install_dependencies_ubuntu
make
make install

This script installs paperCrop in the ~/bin folder.

Mac

make install_dependencies_mac
make
make install

This script installs paperCrop in the ~/bin folder.

  • How to execute.
  1. Easy way:

Assuming ~/bin is in the path, simply type in a terminal

paperCrop aaa.pdf

Or, you can use

~/bin/paperCrop aaa.pdf

Here, paperCrop is a python script located in your ~/bin.

  1. Using a file manager:

Run "papercrop" in the "~/bin/papercrop/paperCrop_bin".

  1. Alternatively, in a terminal:
~/bin/paperCrop

How to uninstall

Just delete the install folder (~/bin/papercrop_bin).