Skip to main content

A-PDF Text Extractor copies texts from copy-protected PDF files

Ever come across a PDF file that disallow you from coping chunks of texts from it?

pdf-copy-protection

There is a nice way to bypass the copy-protection. A-PDF Text Extractor is a software that allows you to do that by extracting texts from all are selected pages of any PDF files, whether copy protected or otherwise. You don’t even need to have a PDF reader installed, because the copied text is available as a TXT file. Amusingly, the publisher/developers themselves are not aware of the copy-protection breaking capability their software posses.

Here is a part of the description from the publisher’s website. (Highlighted for emphasis)

To extract text from a PDF file, the PDF file must meet the following conditions:
- The file is formatted to contain text and not just images.
- The file contains no security restrictions which disable text selecting.

To extract text from a PDF file simply load it into the program and click on “Options”. Here you can specify the range of pages from which you want text to copy. You can either copy all pages, even numbered or odd numbered pages or pages within two page numbers. You can also put custom text or variables into the header and footer section of the extracted pages. Once you are satisfied with the settings click on the “Extract” button.

pdf-text-extractor

There are also different ways to output the extracted text:

In PDF Order - Follow the inner order of PDF files
Smart Rearrange - Rearrange text based on the position.
With Position - Output text at specified positions

However, the outputted text loses all text formatting of the original file since the output is in plain text. A-PDF Text Extractor is still a very useful tool to copy restricted PDF files or doing PDF to Text conversion.

You can also checkout PDF Unlocker, another PDF restriction removal software.
Labels:

Comments

  1. AnonymousAugust 13, 2009 at 8:17 PM

    From Wikipedia: "PDF files may also contain embedded DRM restrictions that provide further controls that limit copying, editing or printing. The restrictions on copying, editing, or printing depend on the reader software to obey them, so the security they provide is limited. Printable documents especially might be saved instead as bitmaps and subject to OCR."

    ReplyDelete
  2. Kaushik PatowaryAugust 13, 2009 at 10:09 PM

    I didn't know PDF protection was so flawed. Thanks for the info, hmmm... Anonymous (Why can't you people use a name?)

    ReplyDelete
  3. Melvin DengAugust 14, 2009 at 9:14 AM

    I'm gonna share nother solution.
    When I meet a protected PDF, I'll convert it to Word format using AnyBizSoft, it supports protected PDF conversion and the output quality is pretty good.
    http://www.anypdftools.com/pdf-to-word.html#163

    ReplyDelete
  4. DaveJuly 27, 2012 at 1:19 PM

    GT Text is also pretty amazing at that.
    I love the speed
    http://gttext.googlecode.com

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

How to Record CPU and Memory Usage Over Time in Windows?

Whenever the computer is lagging or some application is taking too long to respond, we usually fire up task manager and look under the Performance tab or under Processes to check on processor utilization or the amount of free memory available. The task manager is ideal for real-time analysis of CPU and memory utilization. It even displays a short history of CPU utilization in the form of a graph. You get a small time-window, about 30 seconds or so, depending on how large the viewing area is.
17 comments
Read more

Diagram 101: Different Types of Diagrams and When To Use Them

Diagrams are a great way to visualize information and convey meaning. The problem is that there’s too many different types of diagrams, so it can be hard to know which ones you should use in any given situation. To help you out, we’ve created this diagram that lays out the 7 most common types of diagrams and when they’re best used:
Post a Comment
Read more

How to Schedule Changes to Your Facebook Page Cover Photo

Facebook’s current layout, the so called Timeline, features a prominent, large cover photo that some people are using in a lot of different creative ways. Timeline is also available for Facebook Pages that people can use to promote their website or business or event. Although you can change the cover photo as often as you like, it’s meant to be static – something which you design and leave it for at least a few weeks or months like a redesigned website. However, there are times when you may want to change the cover photo frequently and periodically to match event dates or some special promotion that you are running or plan to run. So, here is how you can do that.
1 comment
Read more