Printing a Bookmark list from a pdf

(Kassuba, 1 April 2015)

I take notes electronically in pdf files, most often using bookmarks. I will go through the file and bookmark the words or sentences which are relevant. Every now and again I have wanted to print out the bookmarks that I’ve created (usually in case of technology failure), but for a long time, I have not been able to find out how to do so.

Then recently I found a piece of software that would apparently do that: Evermap’s “AutoBookmark™ Plug-in”. What put me off was the USD$220 to buy that plug-in (Evermap, 2019). Ouch. I felt the price of NZD$310 was a bit steep, when I didn’t know if the plug-in would actually do what I hoped.

However, much further down the search list was another link, to an Acrobat user forum, where a user question was answered pointing the reader to a plug-in called the “Create Bookmark Report”, created by a helpful developer called Rick Borstein (Hull, n.d.). The answer also pointed the reader to Evermap’s software, if Rick’s plug-in didn’t work.

I downloaded Rick’s plug-in (here, Borstein, 2013), then went to the Tools page in Adobe Acrobat, and searched for “action”. When the action wizard appeared, I started it, then clicked “Select a File”, and searched for the file I had downloaded. I changed the file view to all files, then double click on the file I had downloaded (“Create_Bookmark_Report.sequ”).

A dialogue box asked me “Do you want to import this action and Acrobat?”. I clicked “import”. I got a second dialogue box, asking me “The action has one or more steps that execute JavaScript. Do you still want to import the action?”. I clicked “import”. I received the confirmation “The action has been imported. To open it, choose Create Bookmark Report in the Action Wizard panel on the Tools pane”.
Once installed, simply open the pdf that you want to print the bookmarks from, and click “create bookmark report”. You will be asked what folder you want the report to be saved in: the filename will be the same as the open PDF, but with “bookmark” appended to the filename end.

So easy. And free.


Sam

References:

• Borstein, R. (2013). Create Bookmark Report. Retrieved from https://acrobatusers.com/actions-exchange
• Evermap (2019). Create, Edit & Manage: PDF Bookmarks, Links, TOC & Highlights. Retrieved from https://www.evermap.com/AutoBookmark.asp
• Hull, B. (n.d.). Acrobat DC and printing bookmarks and creating TOC's [sic]. Retrieved from https://answers.acrobatusers.com/Acrobat-DC-and-printing-bookmarks-and-creating-TOCs-q280029.aspx
• Kassuba, H. (1 April 2015). Sidebar box: How to work with Actions. Retrieved from https://acrobatusers.com/actions-exchange?trackingid=JZXYQ