I am attempting to convert the contents of several PDF files into plain text. I have read through a number of threads on here, and on other sites, that attempt to do this. So far, nothing has worked. While I may get the occasional word amongst the gibberish, none of them come close to doing the job. Here is a glimpse of the things I have already tried:

Attempt 1: 

use Text::FromAny;

my $pdf_file = "foo.pdf";
my $obj      = Text::FromAny->new(file => $pdf_file);
my $text     = $obj->text;    
print $text;

[download]

Attempt 2: 

use CAM::PDF;

my $pdf_file = "foo.pdf";
my $obj      = CAM::PDF->new($pdf_file) || die "$CAM::PDF::errstr\n";
my $txt      = $obj->getPageText(1);
CAM::PDF->asciify(\$txt);       # same results without this statement.
print $txt;

[download]

Attempt 3: 

use CAM::PDF;
use CAM::PDF::PageText;

my $pdf_file = "foo.pdf";
my $obj      = CAM::PDF->new($pdf_file) || die "$CAM::PDF::errstr\n";
my $tree     = $obj->getPageContentTree(1);
my $txt      = CAM::PDF::PageText->render($tree);
CAM::PDF->asciify(\$txt);       # same results without this statement.
print $txt;

[download]

Attempt 4: Use the getpdftext.pl source at https://metacpan.org/pod/distribution/CAM-PDF/bin/getpdftext.pl

Any other ideas?

In reply to Converting PDF file to text by cerian

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