Comment by BitwiseFool
4 years ago
>"I wanted to rotate a PDF 90 degrees"
I am continually frustrated at just how difficult of a problem simple PDF operations are on Windows PCs. Even looking for alternative PDF readers is a complex and confusing task. And, every top result wants to either charge or require an account to use it. The FOSS tools aren't great either. Why can't Microsoft make a product like Preview for Mac which allows for such things?!?
Shameless plug: I built https://simplePDF.eu as I was similarly frustrated by the lack of a good PDF editor when filling French paperwork.
Checkboxes for example did not seem to be available in any of the tools I found.
I also figured that if I had to spend the time to position the fields, someone else shouldn’t spend that time too: crowd-edited PDF if you will (the document never sees my server)
Wow, works actually amazingly well! Thank you!
Thank you for the kind words!
Basic PDF manipulation has been a constant thorn ever since I started using a computer. I still don't have a single source for it, either. Definitely looking into smallPDF
pdftk can do many of these things. I use it frequently.
https://www.pdflabs.com/tools/pdftk-the-pdf-toolkit/
NAPS2 is primarily a scanner app, but it can also import existing PDF files, following which you can re-arrange and manipulate pages: https://github.com/cyanfish/naps2
I was baffled reading the OP as to why anyone would need to pay to do that. This explains it, thanks.
But it's not. PDF Exchange has a free version and does this for free. There are other software available to do it as well as websites. It's not hard to find for anyone that knows how to type in a few words to google. Sumatra is also a great little pdf viewer (also some simple edits like rotation) for windows.
If you google "PDF Editor", PDF Exchange is not on the first three pages of results. Instead, you get the official Adobe product and other products that are all either paid or freemium. Given that it doesn't appear on the first page, how likely do you think it is the average person will discover PDF Exchange and avoid the hassle?
>"It's not hard to find for anyone that knows how to type in a few words to google." I find this to be pretty dismissive and insulting.
Edit: Lo and behold, PDF-XChange Editor is also a product they are charging for. It is $46.50 for a single license, and there is also a PRO version which costs more. So again, it looks like we haven't solved the "free, simple PDF editor with no upcharge like what Apple provides with Preview" problem.
> Why can't Microsoft make a product like Preview for Mac which allows for such things?!?
I presume it's some nonsense application of antitrust laws preventing this.
Downvotes with no refutation. Stay classy, Reddit.