How can I convert unsearchable PDF files to searchable PDF files?
Hi, this is for the tech folks out there. I've searched the Forum intently, but haven't seen an answer to this. I've been using ABCexplorer for years. It's freeware by Gérard Dumont of France, and it is very useful for creating, editing, collating, playing, and printing various images and files from ABC notation music files. I use it to collate my own tune books for bluegrass, old time, Irish, Scottish, fife and drum, and assorted cats and dogs of tunes and songs. I also use it to print the tune sets used by a pick-up community contra band, a slow fiddle jam, and a currently-covid-canceled Irish session. My problem is that while the PDFs produced by the program are very high quality digital sheet music, the text within the PDF files is not searchable by PDF reading programs, such as Adobe Acrobat Reader, Foxit Reader, or the iOS app GoodReader.
I believe there are programs out there that could take the PDF created by ABCexplorer, use OCR to find the text, and somehow embed that searchable text into a finished PDF file that I can distribute to people. Then, when they wish to find a tune quickly, they can use the search for text function on whatever program or app they are using to find the tune. Since some of the files I hand out have over 500 tunes in them, and several are in no way alphabetized, this would be very handy.
I've tried reading many web pages for all sorts of PDF programs out there, including freeware, shareware, and commercial software, and I am still confused as to what the exact feature or phrase I need to see that indicates that this is possible. Also, while I'll gladly pay an honest amount for good software, I'd rather not drop the very large bundle of cash required to buy Adobe Acrobat for the occasional times I would need it.
If anyone knows of software that can do this, I'm all ears. If anyone knows of another piece of software that can natively create large tunebooks in searchable PDF format from an existing ABC music file (*.abc), I'd be interested in that also. Sorry, not enough brain cells left to switch over and learn MuseScore, Finale, Sibelius, or any of the other music formatting software out there. ABCexplorer hasn't been updated since 2013, but I've got it running fine under Windows 10, so I'll just keep chugging right along with it.
Rob Ross
Apple Valley, Minne-SOH-tah
1996 Flatiron A5-Performer, 1915 Gibson F-2 (loaned to me by a friend), 2008 Kentucky Master KM-505 A-Model
1925 Bacon Peerless tenor banjo (Irish tuning), 1985 Lloyd Laplant F-5, 2021 Ibanez PFT2 Tenor Guitar (GDAE)
and of course, the 1970 Suzuki-Violin-Sha Bowl Back Taterbug
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