Cpdftk Examples
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Decrypt a PDF
cpdftk secured.pdf input_pw foopass output unsecured.pdf
Encrypt a PDF using 128-bit strength (the default), withhold all permissions (the default)
cpdftk 1.pdf output 1.128.pdf owner_pw foopass
Same as above, except password 'baz' must also be used to open output PDF
cpdftk 1.pdf output 1.128.pdf owner_pw foo user_pw baz
Same as above, except printing is allowed (once the PDF is open)
cpdftk 1.pdf output 1.128.pdf owner_pw foo user_pw baz allow printing
Join in1.pdf and in2.pdf into a new PDF, out1.pdf
cpdftk in1.pdf in2.pdf cat output out1.pdf
or (using handles):
cpdftk A=in1.pdf B=in2.pdf cat A B output out1.pdf
or (using wildcards):
cpdftk *.pdf cat output combined.pdf
Remove 'page 13' from in1.pdf to create out1.pdf
cpdftk in.pdf cat 1-12 14-end output out1.pdf
or:
cpdftk A=in1.pdf cat A1-12 A14-end output out1.pdf
Apply 40-bit encryption to output, revoking all permissions (the default). Set the owner PW to 'foopass'.
cpdftk 1.pdf 2.pdf cat output 3.pdf encrypt_40bit owner_pw foopass
Join two files, one of which requires the password 'foopass'. The output is not encrypted.
cpdftk A=secured.pdf 2.pdf input_pw A=foopass cat output 3.pdf
Uncompress PDF page streams for editing the PDF in a text editor (e.g., vim, emacs)
cpdftk doc.pdf output doc.unc.pdf uncompress
Repair a PDF's corrupted XREF table and stream lengths, if possible
cpdftk broken.pdf output fixed.pdf
Burst a single PDF document into pages and dump its data to doc_data.txt
cpdftk in.pdf burst
Burst a single PDF document into encrypted pages. Allow low-quality printing
cpdftk in.pdf burst owner_pw foopass allow DegradedPrinting
Write a report on PDF document metadata and bookmarks to report.txt
cpdftk in.pdf dump_data output report.txt
Rotate the first PDF page to 90 degrees clockwise
cpdftk in.pdf cat 1E 2-end output out.pdf
Rotate an entire PDF document to 180 degrees
cpdftk in.pdf cat 1-endS output out.pdf
Licence
These examples are drawn from the PDFTK manual, which is licensed under the GPL Version 2
