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How to refer to mismatched page numbers in a PDF document?

  • I often need to refer a person to a specific page in a PDF document linked in an email. Sometimes the document contains page numbers on headers or footers that do not match the numbering of the PDF file. For example, the page with “12” displayed in the footer is page 16 of the PDF file, because the file includes four pages of front matter. “Page 1” as labeled in the document is the fifth page of the file, as shown in the document reader’s toolbar. Acrobat and other programs provide tools to make page numbering consistent, but I am not the author of these documents and can’t change how the page numbers have been assigned. What is the best way to describe the target page? I usually say something like “See p. 12 (p. 16/24 of the PDF file).” Is there a better way to describe the page and minimize confusion?

  • Answer:

    "PDF page 38; page 36 as numbered."

Snerd at Ask.Metafilter.Com Visit the source

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Hm. I'd probably say: "Page 10 in the PDF viewer, or page 6 as printed on the document." I think the way you describe it is fine though.

AppleTurnover

You can also link directly to a specific page of a PDF by appending #page=X to the URL. This may not work for all browsers/viewers, but it'll save time and eliminate ambiguity for a lot of readers: http://www.irs.gov/pub/irs-pdf/f1040.pdf#page=2

mbrubeck

The way I usually do this when dealing with artworkers is 'document, folio'. So , to use your example from above the fold, document 16, folio 12. This, of course, depends on the person looking at the document at the other end knowing what I'm on about, so use whatever works for you and the people you're working with.

peteyjlawson

Cardinality vs. ordinality?

Chitownfats

Do you have Acrobat (not reader)? If so, you can build a bookmarks tree with links to that pages in question. If so, you can insert a page and drop in link annotations that point to each page. If you're inclined to write code, this is a straightforward task with iText or iText#. If you use http://www.atalasoft.com/products/dotpdf/ (spoiler: I wrote it), this is downright trivial: // C# sample code - wrote it off the top of my head// source is full path to the source file, dest where you want to save it// captions are the text for each bookmark, pageDests are the 0-based page indicies.public static void AddBookmarks(string source, string dest, string[] captions, int[] pageDests) { using (FileStream instm = new FileStream(source, FileMode.Open)) { // TODO - range check pageDests and make sure the length of captions and pageDests match PdfDocument doc = new PdfDocumnt(source); // wipe out the existing tree doc.BookmarkTree = new PdfBookmarkTree(); // put in the new bookmarks for (int i=0; i < captions.Length; i++) { PdfBookmark mark = new PdfBookmark(captions[i], PdfDestination.FitBoundsAction(pageDests[i]); doc.BookmarkTree.Bookmarks.Add(mark); } doc.Save(dest); }} Me:This product isn't cheap (it's more costly than a single copy of Acrobat, IIRC). Homer:That's bad Me:You can get a free trial Homer:That's good Me:It only lasts 30 days Homer:That's bad Me:It comes with Frogurt Homer:That's good Me:The Frogurt is cursed ...

plinth

If you have Acrobat, you can renumber the pages so they match.

kindall

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