From time to time I need to manipulate PDF files for personal use: split, merge, rotate, compress.
It's not something that warrants the use of specialized heavy duty software, but I also don't want to use free third-party online tools because of the concerns about privacy, security, and added watermarks.
A lot of stuff can be done with Python, so I used to run small scripts in the Python IDE on my desktop.
I currently explore using Google Colab for this:
- I can use Python
- It's free
- There's runtime with enough RAM and disk storage
- I can share the notebook so that others could easily use it too
- There's a nice interface for input parameters
Copies a PDF file into a new PDF file according to a user-defined list of selected pages.
May be used to extract, drop, repeat, reorder pages.
(1 PDF -> 1 PDF)
Merges several PDFs into one PDF file (input files are sorted in an alphabetical order for merging).
(Many PDFs -> 1 PDF)
Rotates selected pages in a PDF file in a chosen direction.
(1 PDF -> 1 PDF)
Splits a PDF file into several output PDF files.
(1 PDF -> Many PDFs)
Converts a PDF file with one page per spread (optimized for printing) into a PDF file with two pages per spread (optimized for reading on a widescreen).
Open in Google Colab, create a copy, and follow instructions in the notebook.