I'm trying to use the update_info command in order to add some bookmarks to an existing pdf's metadata using pdftk and powershell.
I first dump the metadata into a file as follows:
pdftk .\test.pdf dump_data > test.info
Then, I edit the test.info file by adding the bookmarks, I believe I am using the right syntax. I save the test.info file and attempt to write the metadata to a new pdf file using update_info:
pdftk test.pdf update_info test.info output out.pdf
Unfortunately, I get a warning as follows:
pdftk Warning: unexpected case 1 in LoadDataFile(); continuing
out.pdf is generated, but contains no bookmarks. Just to be sure it is not a syntax problem, I also ran it without editing the metadata file, by simply overwriting the same metadata. I still got the same warning.
Why is this warning occurring? Why are no bookmarks getting written to my resulting pdf?
using redirection in that fashion
pdftk .\test.pdf dump_data > test.info
will cause this known problem by building wrong file structure, so change to
pdftk .\test.pdf dump_data output test.info
In addition check your alterations are correctly balanced (and no unusual characters) then save the edited output file in the same encoding.
Note:- you may need to consider
Use dump_data_utf8 and update_info_utf8 in order to properly display characters in scripts other than Latin (e. g. oriental CJK)
I used pdftk --help >pdftk-help.txt to find the answer.
With credit to the previous answer, the following creates a text file of the information parameters: pdftk aaa.pdf dump_data output info.txt
Edit the info.txt file as needed.
The pdftk update_info option creates a new pdf file, leaving the original pdf untouched. Use: pdftk aaa.pdf update_info info.txt output bbb.pdf
One day I just zipped a file with Chinese character called 周國賢 - 密封罩.flac, to a zip, using bandizip & designated encoding to utf-8.
And then I try to unzip it in my MacbookPro, which is (probably) using Macintosh as encoding. The file unzipped is called ©P∞ÍΩ - ±K´ ∏n.flac, which does not match the above Chinese name.
So, I try to test about the encoding, and found that Macintosh->big5 would return the Macintosh mysterious symbol into Cantonese, but have some unmatching characters: 周衰�璀� - 密封罩.flac.
I have tried another file: §˝µ· - ¨ı®ß.ape: and it actually output the correct name of the file: 王菲 - 紅豆.ape
So, here is my question: how do I unzip a file that with big5 chinese character properly and without any information loss? Or how do I zip a file correctly to prevent information loss/ incorrect characters? (edit #2: you can use bandizip to zip the file into utf-8 encoding)
BTW, The encoding converter I am using is https://r12a.github.io/apps/encodings/, which could be quite helpful for you to check for encoding. Don't forget to click change encodings shown. And I am not the owner of the encoding converter.
edit #1: I have found that the setting in bandizip is wrong...well sorry for the inconvenience caused. Nonetheless, I figure out that The Unarchiver in Mac Apple Store can unzip big5 correctly. This can be a workaround, but still I don't know how to unzip big5 characters properly WITHOUT any loss.
I have an xlsx file, I do the following to export it as a .csv :
Export xlsx file as csv using excel, default encoding
Open .csv file with notepad, save it again by specifying the encoding utf8 (notepad saves the BOM)
Open the file with CSV.read(path_to_file)
It seems to work well, but for some reason the first header is corrupted by some unknown character (I have no idea what it is, and when I try to copy paste it it disappears, it is represented as a big white rectangle in Windows)
When I open my file with any text editor, there doesn't seem to be a problem
First line looks like : Id;Type....
In case this helps
csv.headers.first # => ".Id" where . is that character
csv.headers.first.first.bytes # => [239, 187, 191]
csv.headers.first.first.b # => "\xEF\xBB\xBF"
How do I fix that ?
Windows 10, Ruby 2.2
That is the UTF-8 BOM.
Try setting the mode like this:
CSV.read(path_to_file, 'r:bom|utf-8')
I'm running this command from PostgreSQL 9.4 on Windows 8.1:
psql -d dbname -f filenameincurrentdirectory.sql
The sql file has, for example, these commands:
INSERT INTO general_lookups ("name", "old_id") VALUES ('Open', 1);
INSERT INTO general_lookups ("name", "old_id") VALUES ('Closed', 2);`
When I run the psql command, I get this error message:
psql:filenameincurrentdirectory.sql:1: ERROR: syntax error at or near "ÿ_I0811a2h1"
LINE 1: ÿ_I0811a2h1 ru
How do I import a file of SQL commands using psql?
I have no problems utilizing pgAdmin in executing these sql files.
If your issue is BOM, Byte Order Marker, another option is sed. Also kind of nice because if BOM is not your issue it is non-destructive to you data. Download and install sed for windows:
http://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net/packages/sed.htm
The package called "Complete package, except sources" contains additional required libraries that the "Binaries" package doesn't.
Once sed is installed run this command to remove the BOM from your file:
sed -i '1 s/^\xef\xbb\xbf//' filenameincurrentdirectory.sql
Particularly useful if you file is too large for Notepad++
Okay, the problem does have to do with BOM, byte order marker. The file was generated by Microsoft Access. I opened the file in Notepad and saved it as UTF-8 instead of Unicode since Windows saves UTF-16 by default. That got this error message:
psql:filenameincurrentdirectory.sql:1: ERROR: syntax error at or near "INSERT"
LINE 1: INSERT INTO general_lookups ("name", "old_id" ) VAL...
I then learned from another website that Postgres doesn't utilize the BOM and that Notepad doesn't allow users to save without a BOM. So I had to download Notepad++, set the encoding to UTF-8 without BOM, save the file, and then import it. Voila!
An alternative to using Notepad++ is this little python script I wrote. Simply pass in the file name to convert.
import sys
if len(sys.argv) == 2:
with open(sys.argv[1], 'rb') as source_file:
contents = source_file.read()
with open(sys.argv[1], 'wb') as dest_file:
dest_file.write(contents.decode('utf-16').encode('utf-8'))
else:
print "Please pass in a single file name to convert."
This isn't really a programming question, is there a command line or Windows tool (Windows 7) to get the current encoding of a text file? Sure I can write a little C# app but I wanted to know if there is something already built in?
Open up your file using regular old vanilla Notepad that comes with Windows.
It will show you the encoding of the file when you click "Save As...".
It'll look like this:
Whatever the default-selected encoding is, that is what your current encoding is for the file.
If it is UTF-8, you can change it to ANSI and click save to change the encoding (or visa-versa).
I realize there are many different types of encoding, but this was all I needed when I was informed our export files were in UTF-8 and they required ANSI. It was a onetime export, so Notepad fit the bill for me.
FYI: From my understanding I think "Unicode" (as listed in Notepad) is a misnomer for UTF-16.
More here on Notepad's "Unicode" option: Windows 7 - UTF-8 and Unicdoe
If you have "git" or "Cygwin" on your Windows Machine, then go to the folder where your file is present and execute the command:
file *
This will give you the encoding details of all the files in that folder.
The (Linux) command-line tool 'file' is available on Windows via GnuWin32:
http://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net/packages/file.htm
If you have git installed, it's located in C:\Program Files\git\usr\bin.
Example:
C:\Users\SH\Downloads\SquareRoot>file *
_UpgradeReport_Files; directory
Debug; directory
duration.h; ASCII C++ program text, with CRLF line terminators
ipch; directory
main.cpp; ASCII C program text, with CRLF line terminators
Precision.txt; ASCII text, with CRLF line terminators
Release; directory
Speed.txt; ASCII text, with CRLF line terminators
SquareRoot.sdf; data
SquareRoot.sln; UTF-8 Unicode (with BOM) text, with CRLF line terminators
SquareRoot.sln.docstates.suo; PCX ver. 2.5 image data
SquareRoot.suo; CDF V2 Document, corrupt: Cannot read summary info
SquareRoot.vcproj; XML document text
SquareRoot.vcxproj; XML document text
SquareRoot.vcxproj.filters; XML document text
SquareRoot.vcxproj.user; XML document text
squarerootmethods.h; ASCII C program text, with CRLF line terminators
UpgradeLog.XML; XML document text
C:\Users\SH\Downloads\SquareRoot>file --mime-encoding *
_UpgradeReport_Files; binary
Debug; binary
duration.h; us-ascii
ipch; binary
main.cpp; us-ascii
Precision.txt; us-ascii
Release; binary
Speed.txt; us-ascii
SquareRoot.sdf; binary
SquareRoot.sln; utf-8
SquareRoot.sln.docstates.suo; binary
SquareRoot.suo; CDF V2 Document, corrupt: Cannot read summary infobinary
SquareRoot.vcproj; us-ascii
SquareRoot.vcxproj; utf-8
SquareRoot.vcxproj.filters; utf-8
SquareRoot.vcxproj.user; utf-8
squarerootmethods.h; us-ascii
UpgradeLog.XML; us-ascii
Another tool that I found useful: https://archive.codeplex.com/?p=encodingchecker
EXE can be found here
Install git ( on Windows you have to use git bash console). Type:
file --mime-encoding *
for all files in the current directory , or
file --mime-encoding */*
for the files in all subdirectories
Here's my take how to detect the Unicode family of text encodings via BOM. The accuracy of this method is low, as this method only works on text files (specifically Unicode files), and defaults to ascii when no BOM is present (like most text editors, the default would be UTF8 if you want to match the HTTP/web ecosystem).
Update 2018: I no longer recommend this method. I recommend using file.exe from GIT or *nix tools as recommended by #Sybren, and I show how to do that via PowerShell in a later answer.
# from https://gist.github.com/zommarin/1480974
function Get-FileEncoding($Path) {
$bytes = [byte[]](Get-Content $Path -Encoding byte -ReadCount 4 -TotalCount 4)
if(!$bytes) { return 'utf8' }
switch -regex ('{0:x2}{1:x2}{2:x2}{3:x2}' -f $bytes[0],$bytes[1],$bytes[2],$bytes[3]) {
'^efbbbf' { return 'utf8' }
'^2b2f76' { return 'utf7' }
'^fffe' { return 'unicode' }
'^feff' { return 'bigendianunicode' }
'^0000feff' { return 'utf32' }
default { return 'ascii' }
}
}
dir ~\Documents\WindowsPowershell -File |
select Name,#{Name='Encoding';Expression={Get-FileEncoding $_.FullName}} |
ft -AutoSize
Recommendation: This can work reasonably well if the dir, ls, or Get-ChildItem only checks known text files, and when you're only looking for "bad encodings" from a known list of tools. (i.e. SQL Management Studio defaults to UTF16, which broke GIT auto-cr-lf for Windows, which was the default for many years.)
A simple solution might be opening the file in Firefox.
Drag and drop the file into firefox
Press Ctrl+I to open the page info
and the text encoding will appear on the "Page Info" window.
Note: If the file is not in txt format, just rename it to txt and try again.
P.S. For more info see this article.
I wrote the #4 answer (at time of writing). But lately I have git installed on all my computers, so now I use #Sybren's solution. Here is a new answer that makes that solution handy from powershell (without putting all of git/usr/bin in the PATH, which is too much clutter for me).
Add this to your profile.ps1:
$global:gitbin = 'C:\Program Files\Git\usr\bin'
Set-Alias file.exe $gitbin\file.exe
And used like: file.exe --mime-encoding *. You must include .exe in the command for PS alias to work.
But if you don't customize your PowerShell profile.ps1 I suggest you start with mine: https://gist.github.com/yzorg/8215221/8e38fd722a3dfc526bbe4668d1f3b08eb7c08be0
and save it to ~\Documents\WindowsPowerShell. It's safe to use on a computer without git, but will write warnings when git is not found.
The .exe in the command is also how I use C:\WINDOWS\system32\where.exe from powershell; and many other OS CLI commands that are "hidden by default" by powershell, *shrug*.
you can simply check that by opening your git bash on the file location then running the command file -i file_name
example
user filesData
$ file -i data.csv
data.csv: text/csv; charset=utf-8
Some C code here for reliable ascii, bom's, and utf8 detection: https://unicodebook.readthedocs.io/guess_encoding.html
Only ASCII, UTF-8 and encodings using a BOM (UTF-7 with BOM, UTF-8 with BOM,
UTF-16, and UTF-32) have reliable algorithms to get the encoding of a document.
For all other encodings, you have to trust heuristics based on statistics.
EDIT:
A powershell version of a C# answer from: Effective way to find any file's Encoding. Only works with signatures (boms).
# get-encoding.ps1
param([Parameter(ValueFromPipeline=$True)] $filename)
begin {
# set .net current directoy
[Environment]::CurrentDirectory = (pwd).path
}
process {
$reader = [System.IO.StreamReader]::new($filename,
[System.Text.Encoding]::default,$true)
$peek = $reader.Peek()
$encoding = $reader.currentencoding
$reader.close()
[pscustomobject]#{Name=split-path $filename -leaf
BodyName=$encoding.BodyName
EncodingName=$encoding.EncodingName}
}
.\get-encoding chinese8.txt
Name BodyName EncodingName
---- -------- ------------
chinese8.txt utf-8 Unicode (UTF-8)
get-childitem -file | .\get-encoding
Looking for a Node.js/npm solution? Try encoding-checker:
npm install -g encoding-checker
Usage
Usage: encoding-checker [-p pattern] [-i encoding] [-v]
Options:
--help Show help [boolean]
--version Show version number [boolean]
--pattern, -p, -d [default: "*"]
--ignore-encoding, -i [default: ""]
--verbose, -v [default: false]
Examples
Get encoding of all files in current directory:
encoding-checker
Return encoding of all md files in current directory:
encoding-checker -p "*.md"
Get encoding of all files in current directory and its subfolders (will take quite some time for huge folders; seemingly unresponsive):
encoding-checker -p "**"
For more examples refer to the npm docu or the official repository.
Similar to the solution listed above with Notepad, you can also open the file in Visual Studio, if you're using that. In Visual Studio, you can select "File > Advanced Save Options..."
The "Encoding:" combo box will tell you specifically which encoding is currently being used for the file. It has a lot more text encodings listed in there than Notepad does, so it's useful when dealing with various files from around the world and whatever else.
Just like Notepad, you can also change the encoding from the list of options there, and then saving the file after hitting "OK". You can also select the encoding you want through the "Save with Encoding..." option in the Save As dialog (by clicking the arrow next to the Save button).
The only way that I have found to do this is VIM or Notepad++.
EncodingChecker
File Encoding Checker is a GUI tool that allows you to validate the text encoding of one or more files. The tool can display the encoding for all selected files, or only the files that do not have the encodings you specify.
File Encoding Checker requires .NET 4 or above to run.