Editing PDF files in PDFedit under Cygwin

This is one of the few free ways I can find of editing, inlcuding deleting and adding text to a PDF file. It seems complicated but it isn't.

First download Cygwin. Select the qt3 library when you get prompted (you can sort the list of available options to make it easier to find and select - the runtime is what you want). Also select ghostscript (I had problems with fonts before I selected this). It takes a while to install even with a quick connection but you don't really have to do anything, the default options are fine. Watch your Firewall warnings.

Now download PDFedit. Extract the files to their default directories under the created Cygwin directory.

Now run Cygwin. You'll get a command prompt. Type:

$ x

Now start a new Cygwin session and type:

$ pdfedit

If you get an error message about DISPLAY type:

$ export DISPLAY=:0.0 (this selects the created X window to run the application)

It won't open encrypted files unfortunately and it's pretty sluggish to say the least. But it works - perfect if you want to change some text or such like. Just select it with the text select tool and edit the box in the toolbar to what you want. Sometimes it selects a whole sentance or part of - look at the parameters in the right frame and you should be able to edit each character seperately. It doesn't seem to update as it should but try copy and paste or scrolling around.

Can't see a way of creating form fields. Oh and if it gives a warning about "linearized PDF" it doesn't seem to really matter, but you can delin the file using the delin lin PDF tool.

For form filling found PDFill very good and at $20 prolly worth the price.