On Wednesday, November 27, 2019 12:07:16 PM Richard Owlett wrote: > I'm trying to create some spreadsheets containing nutritional data. > > Sample documents I'm using for input include: > > https://choosemyplate-prod.azureedge.net/sites/default/files/2WeekMenusGr > > oceryList.pdf > > > > https://choosemyplate-prod.azureedge.net/sites/default/files/2WeekMenusAn > > dFoodGroupContent.pdf > > > > http://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/files/docs/public/heart/new_dash.pdf > > Using "pdftotext -layout input.pdf output.txt" is tantalizingly close > to what I want. > > When PRINTED that visually preserves relationships. > I wish to copy a column of data to a spreadsheet, but can only select > horizontally, NOT vertically.
I didn't try your pdftotext command, so I don't know how tantalizingly close that got you. I opened one of the .pdfs in Okular, then switched to selection mode and selected a column of data using the mouse. I then copied it to a text editor. It looks very columnar to me, with the only (minor) problems being an extra line containing some unprintable characters (□ -- copied and pasted here, but they show up differently in nedit) (and a line end character). I'm sure that could easily be imported into a spreadsheet just specifying those unprintable characters as the record separator (using that text file). (I used Okular 0.14.3 as distributed in Wheezy.) > > I suspect it may not be practical in the general case. > Are there any examples that might come close?
