PDF to PDF/A converter

Guide and script for conversion PDF to PDF/A

Prerequisites

In order to make the script work the following two packages are needed:

• pdftops (poppler package)
• gs (ghostscript package)

Installation

Check

Check if both commands are already installed trying:

• pdftops -v
• gs -v

Both commands should give version and copyright. If the fail, go to installation guide.

Linux installation

Use your favorite package distribution tool to install poppler-utils (in some distribution named simply poppler) and ghostscript.

For Debian distributions:

apt install -y poppler-utils ghostscript

MacOS installation

Install brew CLI (HomeBrew https://brew.sh/index_it), then launch:

brew install poppler
brew install ghostscript

Verify

After installation verify existence and installations of commands, as in "Check" section above.

Execution permissions

Give execution permissions for script:

chmod 777 convert_pdf.sh

Script quick usage

Move the script in same folder of file to be converted.

Open the terminal and launch:

./convert_pdf.sh <filename>.pdf

The result will be the presence of two new files:

• <filename>.ps # PostScript file created during process
• <filename>_a.pdf # PDF/A wanted file

Script global usage

Move script to local bin folder:

cp convert_pdf.sh /usr/local/bin/convert_pdf

After this copy, the command convert_pdf will be available in terminal. So in any folder it is possible to run:

convert_pdf <filename>.pdf

The result will be the same as before.