Merge PDFs / Arrange pdf pages

merge in order

pdfunite file1.pdf file2.pdf <...> output.pdf

(last filename should not exist. If you fail to provide it, the last pdf will be overwritten):

 

arrange pages:

sudo apt-get install libreoffice-pdfimport
libreoffice <file.pdf>

File menu -> export to PDF

(disadvantage: the resulting file is pretty big)

 

convert color pdf to greyscale:

gs \
 -sOutputFile=output.pdf \
 -sDEVICE=pdfwrite \
 -sColorConversionStrategy=Gray \
 -dProcessColorModel=/DeviceGray \
 -dCompatibilityLevel=1.4 \
 -dAutoRotatePages=/None\
 -dNOPAUSE \
 -dBATCH \
 input.pdf

sources:

• https://superuser.com/questions/104656/convert-a-pdf-to-greyscale-on-the-command-line-in-floss
• https://askubuntu.com/questions/162037/how-to-edit-pdfs
• http://stackoverflow.com/questions/2507766/merge-convert-multiple-pdf-files-into-one-pdf

 

manipulating pdf files: pdftk (pdf toolkit):

• https://www.pdflabs.com/tools/pdftk-the-pdf-toolkit/
• https://www.linux.com/learn/manipulating-pdfs-pdf-toolkit

more: https://wiki.ubuntuusers.de/PDF (german)

 

Great tools to use in ubuntu / linux

A few applications that help me a lot daily

Application	Purpose	install command
zim	note taking	sudo apt-get install zim
RedNotebook	agenda	sudo apt-get install rednotebook
Alarm Clock	Alarm/ Timer	sudo apt-get install alarm-clock-applet
Geany	text editor	sudo apt-get install geany
Kdiff3	file/ folder comparator	sudo apt-get install kdiff3*- note, it will install a lot of kde stuff
Midnight Commander	file manager (console)	sudo apt-get install mc
vim	tesxt editor (console)	sudo apt-get install vim
pinta	image editor	sudo apt-get install pinta
Image magick	image editor (console)	sudo apt-get install imagemagick imagemagick-doc
bleachbit	system cleanup	sudo apt-get install bleachbit
k4dirstat	disk usage	sudo apt install k4dirstat
htop	system monitoring (console)	sudo apt install htop
iotop	file monitor (console)	sudo apt install iotop