Modifying PDF file using Python

Last Updated : 18 May, 2022

The following article depicts how a PDF can be modified using python’s pylovepdf module. The Portable Document Format(PDF) is a file format developed by Adobe in 1993 to present documents, including text formatting and images, in a manner independent of application software, hardware, and operating systems.

pylovepdf module can be downloaded using pip command:

pip install pylovepdf

The iLovePDF API i.e ‘pylovepdf’ module is organized around REST. Their API are predictable, resource-oriented URLs, and uses HTTP response codes to indicate API errors. They use built-in HTTP features, like HTTP authentication and HTTP verbs, which are understood by off-the-shelf HTTP clients. They support cross-origin resource sharing, allowing you to interact securely with their API from a client-side web application. With this API we can compress the PDF files, also can add watermark, convert them to images and even split them and vice -versa and lots of other stuff.

In order to do so first we need a public-key to use this module, for that login on to https://developer.ilovepdf.com/ and after login the public key will be visible in the ‘My Projects’ section. Below is the screenshot of the public key

Now since we have our public key, we can use this API for modifying any PDF file using the steps given below:

1. Creating a ILovePdf object using the public key
2. Uploading the PDF file
3. Processing the PDF file
4. Downloading the PDF file

Implementation of this module is depicted properly using examples. Click here for the PDF used in the examples provided in this article:

Example 1: Compressing the PDF file

Python3

   # importing the ilovepdf api
from pylovepdf.ilovepdf import ILovePdf
 
# public key
public_key = 'paste_your_public_key_here'
 
# creating a ILovePdf object
ilovepdf = ILovePdf(public_key, verify_ssl=True)
 
# assigning a new compress task
task = ilovepdf.new_task('compress')
 
# adding the pdf file to the task
task.add_file('my_pdf.pdf')
 
# setting the output folder directory
# if no folder exist it will create one
task.set_output_folder('output_folder')
 
# execute the task
task.execute()
 
# download the task
task.download()
 
# delete the task
task.delete_current_task()
 
  

Before processing:

Output :

After Processing:

Example 2: Splitting the PDF

Python

   # public key
from pylovepdf.ilovepdf import ILovePdf
public_key = 'paste your code here'
 
# importing the ilovepdf api
 
# creating a ILovePdf object
ilovepdf = ILovePdf(public_key, verify_ssl=True)
 
# assigning a new split task 
task = ilovepdf.new_task('split')
 
# adding the pdf file to the task
task.add_file('my_pdf.pdf')
 
 
# setting the output folder directory
# if no folder exist it will create one
task.set_output_folder('output_folder')
 
# execute the task
task.execute()
 
# download the task
task.download()
 
# delete the task
task.delete_current_task()
 
  