Built In PDF Magic in Debian
Debian has some awesome PDF tools built right in via the poppler-utilspackage that I never knew about. In my previous post I talked about how to make beautiful documents with code snippets using various Sublime Text extensions to convert markdown into PDF. One issue that I ran into was getting a cover page created. As far as I know There is really no easy way to make a nice cover page in markdown. Specifically in Github Flavored Markdown (which is what I am using) there is not a good way to make a page break. The easy solution would be to simple write up your entire document in Markdown, and then make a separate cover page. The problem is how to merge these two files together to make one document. Thanks to the built in PDF tools in debian this becomes very simple! The poppler-utils package has the following utilities built in:
- pdfdetach — lists or extracts embedded files (attachments)
- pdffonts — font analyzer
- pdfimages — image extractor
- pdfinfo — document information
- pdfseparate — page extraction tool
- pdftocairo — PDF to PNG/JPEG/PDF/PS/EPS/SVG converter using Cairo
- pdftohtml — PDF to HTML converter
- pdftoppm — PDF to PPM/PNG/JPEG image converter
- pdftops — PDF to PostScript (PS) converter
- pdftotext — text extraction
- pdfunite — document merging tool
pdfunite coverpage.pdf content.pdf final.pdfThank you for reading! Share your thoughts with me on bluesky, mastodon, or via email.
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Recent Favorite Blog Posts
This is a collection of the last 8 posts that I bookmarked.
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- Skip the Next iPhone from Articles on Jose M.
- Have smart glasses finally hit an inflection point? from The Torment Nexus
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- Pluralistic: LLMs are slot-machines (16 Aug 2025) from Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow
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Articles from blogs I follow around the net
Who Is The Sky? by David Byrne
Seeing David Byrne last night for the first-ever performance of Who Is The Sky was one of the best and most impactful concerts/experiences of my life.
via Blog – Brad Frost September 17, 2025Pluralistic: Conspiratorialism's causal chain (17 Sep 2025)
Today's links Conspiratorialism's causal chain: A four-part begat. Hey look at this: Delights to delectate. Object permanence: Legal threats over HDCP leaks; Print your own TSA luggage keys; "A Natural History of Empty Lots." Upcoming appe…
via Pluralistic: Daily links from Cory Doctorow September 17, 2025Theatre Review: Interview (Understudy Performance) ★★★☆☆
One of the best things about London theatre is that once in a while a show will give its understudies a chance to break out of the dressing room and soar on the stage. It's a chance to see talented performers at a discount price. What's not to lik…
via Terence Eden’s Blog September 17, 2025Generated by openring