pdf-scraper/README.md

Pure javascript cross-platform module to extract text from PDFs.

# pdf-scraper

**Pure javascript cross-platform module to extract texts from PDFs.**

Forked by Designly, from: https://gitlab.com/autokent/pdf-scraper.
Original Author: Mehmet Kozan

## Similar Packages
* [pdf2json](https://www.npmjs.com/package/pdf2json) buggy, no support anymore, memory leak, throws non-catchable fatal errors
* [j-pdfjson](https://www.npmjs.com/package/j-pdfjson) fork of pdf2json
* [pdf-scraperr](https://github.com/dunso/pdf-scraper) buggy, no tests
* [pdfreader](https://www.npmjs.com/package/pdfreader) using pdf2json
* [pdf-extract](https://www.npmjs.com/package/pdf-extract) not cross-platform using xpdf

## Installation
`npm install pdf-scraper`

## Basic Usage - Local Files

```js
import fs from 'fs'
import PDF from 'pdf-scraper'

let dataBuffer = fs.readFileSync('path to PDF file...');

PDF(dataBuffer).then(function(data) {

	// number of pages
	console.log(data.numpages);
	// pages array
	console.log(data.pages);
	// number of rendered pages
	console.log(data.numrender);
	// PDF info
	console.log(data.info);
	// PDF metadata
	console.log(data.metadata);
	// PDF.js version
	// check https://mozilla.github.io/pdf.js/getting_started/
	console.log(data.version);
	// PDF text
	console.log(data.text);

});
```

## Basic Usage - HTTP
You can use [crawler-request](https://www.npmjs.com/package/crawler-request) which uses the `pdf-scraper`

## Exception Handling

```js
import fs from 'fs'
import PDF from 'pdf-scraper'

let dataBuffer = fs.readFileSync('path to PDF file...');

PDF(dataBuffer).then(function(data) {
	// use data
})
.catch(function(error){
	// handle exceptions
})
```

## Extend
* v1.0.9 and above break pagerender callback
* If you need another format like json, you can change page render behaviour with a callback
* Check out https://mozilla.github.io/pdf.js/

```js
// default render callback
function render_page(pageData) {
    //check documents https://mozilla.github.io/pdf.js/
    let render_options = {
        //replaces all occurrences of whitespace with standard spaces (0x20). The default value is `false`.
        normalizeWhitespace: false,
        //do not attempt to combine same line TextItem's. The default value is `false`.
        disableCombineTextItems: false
    }

    return pageData.getTextContent(render_options)
	.then(function(textContent) {
		let lastY, text = '';
		for (let item of textContent.items) {
			if (lastY == item.transform[5] || !lastY){
				text += item.str;
			}
			else{
				text += '\n' + item.str;
			}
			lastY = item.transform[5];
		}
		return text;
	});
}

let options = {
    pagerender: render_page
}

let dataBuffer = fs.readFileSync('path to PDF file...');

PDF(dataBuffer,options).then(function(data) {
	//use new format
});
```

## Options

```js
const DEFAULT_OPTIONS = {
	// internal page parser callback
	// you can set this option, if you need another format except raw text
	pagerender: render_page,

	// max page number to parse
	max: 0,

	//check https://mozilla.github.io/pdf.js/getting_started/
	version: 'v1.10.100'
}
```
### *pagerender* (callback)
If you need another format except raw text.

### *max* (number)
Max number of page to parse. If the value is less than or equal to 0, parser renders all pages.

### *version* (string, pdf.js version)
check [pdf.js](https://mozilla.github.io/pdf.js/getting_started/)

* `'default'`
* `'v1.9.426'`
* `'v1.10.100'`
* `'v1.10.88'`
* `'v2.0.550'`

>*default* version is *v1.10.100*
>[mozilla.github.io/pdf.js](https://mozilla.github.io/pdf.js/getting_started/#download)