PdfGrabber (Windows) FAQs

Information on and answers to some of the most frequently asked questions in conjunction with the use of our software “PdfGrabber”.

Search FAQs

PdfGrabber 8 and PdfEditor 3 are executable up to and including Windows 10 – Version 1607.

The subsequent version 1703 (Windows Creators-Update) is comparable with the earlier version jumps of Microsoft (e.g. “7 to 8” or “8 to 10”) and introduced considerable changes in the operating system, which also affect PdfEditor 3 and PdfGrabber 8.

If you want to use PdfEditor or PdfGrabber under Windows 10 from version 1703, please update to the current PdfGrabber/PdfEditor version.

To update please visit our shop for updates & upgrades.

Issue: During installation you get error 1327, which references an invalid drive number.

Causes: The System Registry may be erroneously pointing to an invalid or temp drive.

Solution:

  • Back up your Windows Registry.
  • Open Windows Start menu, choose ‘Run’ (on Windows 10 press [WINDOWS + R]), type “regedit” and press [ENTER].
  • Navigate to the folder: HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Explorer\User Shell Folders
  • On the right search for entries that list the incorrect drive.
  • Modify the incorrect drive to the correct drive letter, i.e. C:\.

PixelPlanet PdfPrinter” can be used to reduce the size of PDF files (included in PdfEditor and PdfGrabber). To do this, simply regenerate your PDF by opening it in Acrobat Reader and then “print” it to the “PixelPlanet PdfPrinter”.

In the print settings, the following options can be used to reduce the file size:

PDF verkleinern mit PdfPrinter

Tesseract OCR language packages are normally saved to the directory “%programdata%\PixelPlanet\Tesseract3_5”.

They can, however, also be manually saved to the installation directory:

PdfEditor:
“%programdata%\PixelPlanet\Tesseract3_5\tessdata\”

AND

“C:\Program Files (x86)\PixelPlanet\PdfEditor 4\Tesseract3_5\tessdata\”

PdfGrabber:
“%programdata%\PixelPlanet\Tesseract3_5\tessdata\”

AND

“C:\Program Files (x86)\PixelPlanet\PdfGrabber 4\Tesseract3_5\tessdata\”

Extract the content of the respective ZIP file (see below) into the previously named directories.

Language packages

Afrikaans,
Amharic,
Arabic,
Assamese,
Azerbaijani,
Azerbaijani – Cyrillic,
Belarusian,
Bengali,
Tibetian,
Bosnian,
Bulgarian,
Catalan,
Cebuano,
Czech,
Chinese (Simplified),
Chinese (Traditional),
Cherokee,
Welsh,
Danish,
German,
Dzongkha,
Greek (modern),
English,
English, Middle (1100-1500),
Esperanto,
Estonian,
Basque,
Persian,
Finnish,
French,
Frankish,
Hebrew,
Hindu,
Hungarian,
Indonesian,
Italian,
Japanese,
Korean,
Latvian,
Lithuanian,
Dutch,
Norwegian,
Polish,
Portuguese,
Romanian,
Russian,
Slovak,
Slovene,
Serbian,
Spanish,
Albanian,
Serbian,
Serbian (Latin),
Swedish,
Tagalog,
Thai,
Turkish,
Ukrainian,
Uzbek,
Uzbek (Cyrillic),
Vietnamese,
Yiddish

No, the PdfPrinter must always be installed locally, even with network version.

PdfGrabber was installed whilst another user (with administrator rights) was logged on. You require the login data (password) of this or another user with administrator rights for this computer.

Whilst the user who experienced the problem is logged on, the following steps are taken:

In the start menu call up the context menu of the PdfGrabber link by clicking on it with the right mouse button. Select the context menu option ‘Execute as…’ In the next window, first select the ‘Next user’ option, followed by an entry for a user with administrator rights in the relevant selection box. The user password must be entered here.

PdfGrabber starts:
Open the menu item ‘Options – Preferences’. On the ‘Integration” tab, deactivate ‘Windows Explorer Integration’ and ‘Microsoft Office Integration’ in the ‘Plugins’ area and confirm this by pressing the ‘Apply’ button. Then reactivate the ‘Windows Explorer Integration’ and ‘Microsoft Office Integration’ options and close the preferences window by clicking on ‘OK’.

If the ‘Execute as…’ menu is not available, this can either be due to the operating system used or the fact that the menu has been deactivated in the network for the entire system by the system administrator. In either case, please contact your system administrator.

Ensure that the missing objects are not merely fill areas without outlines. To this end, repeat export with the option ‘Fillings – paint fillings’ activated.
In the PDF document all objects which look like letters/text are, in reality, character commands. Take, for example, an ‘i’:

Instead of the command ‘Text output:i’ in the PDF source text, the instructions: ‘Draw a point’ and ‘Draw a short vertical line’ are issued. If there are no text output instructions in the PDF document, no text entities will be generated in the DXF. Character instructions will be exported as character entities and text output instructions as text entities. Changing the preferences for the text output has no influence upon this, this is also true for the preference that no texts are to be exported.

The PDF does not contain vector graphics but rather an embedded image and/or the page was scanned. This means that no character/line information is available which would enable (re)conversion to a DXF document. If only parts are missing then these are often either the legend or the logo of the CAD original file of a CAD drawing which otherwise has character and line information available. As part of a crosscheck, the page can be exported with the profile: Images – Contained images. If images are exported, there is no output to DXF for the corresponding areas.
Many PDF documents contain embedded fonts. Yet within these fonts the characters are ‘mapped’ differently, i.e., the assignments are mixed up (for example, the ‘b’ is the ‘a’). With the exception of special cases, PdfGrabber is able to ‘break down’ this mapping and display the correct letters. To ensure this, however, the original font from the PDF document must be used to display the text in the exported document. Yet, with export to DXF this is not possible given the restrictions as regards the fonts available in DXF. Depending on the setting, when exporting to DXF attempts are made to use a replacement font whereby the ‘broken down’ mapping is lost.
For scan-based documents you need to activate OCR (Optical Character Recognition) because what you see in the PDF is not text, but a graphic image (picture).

PdfGrabber (Windows version only) offers the following command line parameters with the Professional version:

/LANGID 1031 (German)
/LANGID 1033 (English)
/LANGID 1036 (French)
Starts PdfGrabber with selected GUI language.

/[“filename”] Converts the specified file with the last selected or current profile.

/profile [“profilename”] [“filename”] The specified profile is used for processing. If no profile name is specified, the last selected or current profile is used. Note that profile names are not always unique, e.g. the profile name “Continuous text” is used for the export formats Word and Text (i.e. several times).

/profileid [“Index”] The index of the respective profile can also be used for profile selection. The index should always be used if the export is to be carried out by a standard profile whose profile name is not unique, e.g. the profile name “Continuous text” is used for the export formats Word and Text (i.e. several times).

/SILENT oder /S
Converts the specified file in silent mode. PdfGrabber converts the file in the background and is finally closed again.

/close
PdfGrabber converts the file and finally will be closed again.

/show
Opens the converted documents after successful export.

/pages [“page area”] Converts the specified pages/page ranges, e.g. /pages “1,3-5;12”. If the value “even” is specified, all pages with even page numbers are exported, if “odd” is specified, all pages with odd page numbers are exported. All page numbers refer to the document pages.

/pass [“password”] Allows you to specify a password if this is necessary to open or convert the PDF file.

/output [“directory”] Saves the converted files in the specified directory instead of the folder specified by the profile.

/outfilename [“filename”] Saves the converted file under the specified file name. This allows the output file name to be determined differently from the original PDF file name. Saves the exported files in the specified directory instead of the folder specified by the profile if a complete directory path is specified.

/move [“directory”] Moves the processed PDF file to the specified directory.

You can also test the parameters with the demo version.

Example:

At the Windows command prompt (cmd.exe), simply type:

“C:\program files (x86)\PixelPlanet\PdfGrabber 9\PdfGrabber.exe” /profile [profilename] [filename]

Replace [profilename] with the desired profile name (possibly with “ ”) and [filename] with the document to be exported (“path + name”).

If parameter values are set in quotation marks (“…”) in these instructions, the following applies: Use is not mandatory, but is recommended. General use, for example, avoids the common problem that a file path contains spaces and is therefore not recognized as a related parameter. The parameter identifiers themselves with the prefix ‘/’ (e.g. the parameter /profileid ) must not be enclosed in quotation marks.

In addition, PdfGrabber offers control functions via COM interface. The COM interface definition lies in the PdfGrabber.exe and can be integrated into your development environment via a type library import.
The functions are not available in PdfGrabber-Standard version, so the end user has to license a Professional version.

Furthermore you can use the ‘Monitored Folder’ function from the Professional version onwards to control the PdfGrabber from an external application. A folder can be defined for each profile, which is monitored by the PdfGrabber. As soon as a new file is saved in this folder, the export starts and the file is then saved in the output directory specified by you. You can specify this function in the options.

The “output quality” can be defined in Excel’s format options. This sliding scale can be used to choose between “exact (many columns)” and “easy to edit (few columns)”. The setting should be made or adjusted to suit each new PDF document. It is recommended to start the export with a mid-range setting. If the Excel file output has too many columns, you should select a higher setting (move slide to the right). If there are not enough columns, select a lower setting (move slide to the left). If necessary, conduct several test runs in order to obtain the best setting for each particular document.
To export your PDF files as a RTF/Word file, proceed as follows:

1. Start up the PdfGrabber and select the desired output format in the upper section of the window. The software offers a number of different output formats which satisfy different requirements. To achieve your goal, select the format ‘Word/RTF Text box-layout’. All of the settings that are necessary for the most detailed possible export into RTF/Word format are preselected here.
2. In the middle section of the window select the relevant ‘Source Document’. In order to add a document to the list, press the ‘Add’ button. Select the required PDF file from the subsequent file dialogue.
3. Next press the ‘Start’ button to begin the export process. During export, a message window appears showing the latest status information.
4. Once the export process is complete, the exported Word document is opened in Microsoft Word, provided that this program is installed on your computer.

NOTE: Please note that the export time depends on the size of the document and the type of the PDF document. PDF documents that contain numerous images usually require a longer export time.

If the PC receiving the document displays it incorrectly, this is usually due to missing fonts on the target PC. To solve the problem, activate the “Embed TrueType fonts” option in “Profile — Edit — Format — Rich text format options”. Be aware that this option will increase the size of the file.
If you open the exported documents with Microsoft Word, make sure that you have selected the “Page layout” or “Online layout” mode under “View”. The phenomenon described can occur in “Normal” mode.
A lot of resources are required to export very large PDF documents. For example, although images in the PDF document are compressed and therefore relatively small, they have to be decompressed before they can be exported. One high-resolution image can easily take up 50 MB or more, which can lead to lengthy processing times where there are a lot of images or for large documents.

The following options are available to solve this problem:

a) Make sure your system has sufficient storage space.
b) Deactivate the export of “images” and “lines as background image” under “Format — format options” in profile settings in order not to export any graphic images and to keep file sizes smaller.
c) Export the document in stages (pages 1 – 100, pages 101 – 200, etc.). You can set the page ranges you require in the profile options in the index card “Ranges” tab.

Make sure that you are using the latest version of PdfGrabber. The output of lines and frames is possible as of version 1.0.0.24 for RTF/Word profiles ‘Text boxes’ and ‘Tabulator layout’. Lines and vectors can also be optionally exported as background graphics. To this end, in the profile options under ‘Format — Format options’ activate the option ‘Export lines as graphic’. The output of lines, frames and vectors with other profiles is, in part, under preparation. Frames and background colours can be output, including with native Excel export, as of version 2.5.
There can be various reasons for a faulty output. If possible, send the PDF file concerned to our support team by e-mail. Also specify the format you want to export to, and how we can reach you. Naturally all documents sent to us will be treated confidentially and only used for internal error analysis.
Yes, as long as the password for the file is known. PdfGrabber supports you in processing password-protected documents by means of extensive password administration services.

Yes, PdfGrabber (Windows-Edition) comes with a PDF printer with which PDF documents can be created from any application using a printer driver. The required PDFs can be exported, the necessary changes made and the file then subsequently saved again as a PDF.

Note: This feature is available with Microsoft Windows XP or higher!

You can order the full version of the PdfGrabber software from our online shop or your software dealer. Delivery is via download. You will be sent an unlocking code by e-mail. If you do not want to order via the Internet, you can also fax your order to us (+49 421 24778-24).

The demo version adds random Xs to the exported text. This no longer occurs in the full version of the PdfGrabber. If you have already purchased a license for the full version of the software, and the Xs still appear, ensure that you have activated the software with the license data. The demo version also places a stamp on graphics; this is also no longer the case with the full version. You can order the full version of the PdfGrabber from our shop or contact your software dealer.