By name: pdf description: |- Handle PDF manipulation, form filling, text/table extraction, and high-fidelity generation. Use for professional PDF reports, merging documents, and automated form processing. Use proactively when visual quality and verification are critical.
Examples: - user: "Fill this PDF form and verify" -> populate fields and inspect images - user: "Merge these reports and add a watermark" -> use pypdf - user: "Extract this complex table to Excel" -> use pdfplumber for layout preservation
🛠 High-Fidelity Creation
When generating polished reports:
- Generate: Use Reportlab (programmatic) or Platypus (templated) as the primary engine.
- Preview: Convert every page to PNG for inspection:
pdftoppm -png -r 150 document.pdf page
- Inspect: Verify that charts, tables, and typography are sharp and well-aligned.
📋 Common Operations
1. Form Filling
- Identify fillable fields using
scripts/extract_form_field_info.py. - Reference: See
references/forms.mdfor detailed instructions on filling PDF forms. - Populate fields programmatically and verify using the Render loop.
2. Manipulation (pypdf)
- Merge: Use
PdfWriterto combine multiple documents. - Split: Extract individual pages into new files.
- Secure: Add passwords or watermarks using
PdfWriter.encrypt(). - Reference: See
references/reference.mdfor advanced features and JS library alternatives.
3. Extraction (pdfplumber)
- Extract text with layout preservation.
- Extract complex tables directly into Pandas DataFrames for analysis.
💎 Quality Expectations
- Legibility: Text must be readable at 100% zoom; avoid walls of dense text.
- Polish: Maintain intentional visual design—consistent margins and color palettes.
- Verification: Zero defects (black squares, clipped text) permitted in final output.