Re: editing a PDF [Re: emacs 30.5.0 editing epub]

["gebser@mousecar.com" <gebser@mousecar.com>]

On 3/19/23 7:59 PM, Michael Heerdegen wrote:
> "gebser@mousecar.com" <gebser@mousecar.com> writes:
> 
>> How does one edit a PDF file in emacs?  When I downloaded
>> https://www.gnu.org.ua/software/direvent/manual/direvent.pdf, loaded
>> it into emacs, and tried to edit it, I could see it it and read it,
>> but I couldn't even highlight a part of the text so I could copy
>> it... nor could I make any changes to it.
> 
> I don't think you want to edit pdf in Emacs: the file contents are not
> human readable, and Emacs doesn't provide features to allow graphical
> editing like those pdf editors (at least not built in).
> 
> epub files can contain human readable parts like html, however.
> 
> What I had written:
> 
>>> I managed to copy an pdf-File into an epub Archive.  Opened the
>>> archive and opened the pdf using doc-view.  I was not able to provoke an
>>> error.  Saving worked successfully however I tried.
> 
> was only happening because I was trying around how to provoke the
> reported error.
> 
> Michael.

Yep, of course that was the paragraph I was reading too.

It is kinda weird that, with all the many things that emacs can do, it 
can't take the info from doc-view (which obviously understands all the 
pieces of a pdf-- down to its bits-- and how they all go together to 
make a document) and edit it... it's pretty much implausible to believe 
emacs *can't* do that.  But then, I've always thought reality was 
completely implausible.  :^/