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I've about 15 gigabyte of PDFs scanned with an old version of Adobe Acrobat that are huge.

Adobe Acrobat XI Standard that comes with my new scanner has an option to (it seems lossless) recompress these PDFs. Usually this saves over 2/3 of a document, often even 80% or 90%.

Given that there is about 7 thousand files, I want to automate this process.

This is how you do this manually:

  1. open the PDF file in Adobe Acrobat XI Standard
  2. in the File menu choose, Save as Other... then Reduced size PDF
  3. in the dialog, from Make compatible with choose Acrobat 10 and later, then press OK
  4. in the Save As dialog, keep the filename, then press Save
  5. wait (sometimes long, this can take a minute for files that like 50 megabytes large) for completion

How can I automate this?

(it looks like the ScanSnap software does at least some UI automation here and there, so it looks possible somehow)

4 Answers 4

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This is how I did it in Adobe Acrobat XI Standard:

The trick is to ensure no PDF files are open in Adobe Acrobat XI Standard. Then the Reduce side PDF... behaviour is different.

I used C:\temp as folder for the steps below. You can enhance the steps by

These are the steps I used

  1. Start Adobe Acrobat XI Standard, ensure there are no PDF files opened
  2. in the File menu choose, Save as Other... then Reduced size PDF...
  3. in the Arrange Documents dialog, choose Add Files..., then Add Files... (confused? see the images below)
  4. in the Add Files dialog, select a bunch of PDF files
  5. repeat steps 3. and 4 when needed, or drag files from Windows Explorer, Everything Search Engine, et cetera
  6. in the Arrange Documents dialog, press OK
  7. in the Reduce File Size dialog, from the Make compatible with listbox, choose Acrobat 10 and later, then press OK
  8. in the Output Options dialog, keep the settings, then press OK
  9. wait until the progress dialog has shown all files have been processed and returns itself to the main Adobe Acrobat XI Standard window

Notes:

  • The wait can take very long, especially with thousands of files
  • I converted on copies of each directory so I could view before/after results

    1. Started Adobe Acrobat XI Standard Started Adobe Acrobat XI Standard
    2. Main window: Chose File, then Save as Other..., then Reduced size PDF... Main window: Chose <code>File</code>, then <code>Save as Other...</code>, then <code>Reduced size PDF...</code>
    3. Arrange Documents dialog: Chose Add Files..., then Add Files... <code>Arrange Documents</code> dialog: Chose <code>Add Files...</code>, then <code>Add Files...</code>
    4. Add files dialog: Added files from C:\temp <code>Add files</code> dialog: Added files from <code>C:\temp</code>
    5. Arrange Documents dialog: Choose OK <code>Arrange Documents</code> dialog: Choose <code>OK</code>
    6. Reduce File Size dialog: chose Acrobat 10 and later, then OK <code>Reduce File Size</code> dialog: chose <code>Acrobat 10 and later</code>, then <code>OK</code>
    7. Output Options dialog: kept the settings, then pressed OK<code>Output Options</code> dialog: kept the settings, then pressed <code>OK</code>
    8. Progress dialog: wait until all files have been processed <code>Progress</code> dialog: wait until all files have been processed
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You would create an Action, using the Action Wizard in Acrobat XI (Pro).

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  • Your answer needs to be expanded. Please edit it to explain why your solution addresses the OPs question. Jan 1, 2015 at 23:22
  • I've only Adobe Acrobat XI Standard. Can I use Actions there? Where can I find more information about them? Jan 2, 2015 at 4:02
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    @JeroenWiertPluimers: I can't verify it personally (there is no Acrobat Standard for my platform), but you can quickly verify if you have the Action Wizard, by checking in the Tools panel. To be sure that you have all tools visible, you may click on the very discreet icon at the top right of the Tools panel. The item you look for would be called "Action Wizard". If it is not, and it is a one-time job, and if you can use virtual machines (WMWare), your workaround would be using the trial license of Acrobat Pro, and make and run the Action there.
    – Max Wyss
    Jan 2, 2015 at 6:31
  • @Twisty: This is the way batch processes are done in Acrobat; the answer is terse, but sufficient.
    – Max Wyss
    Jan 2, 2015 at 6:32
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    @JeroenWiertPluimer: The Acrobat help has a section about Actions, and there are tutorials on Acrobatusers.com. Have a good flight.
    – Max Wyss
    Jan 2, 2015 at 10:17
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You can create a batch process in Adobe Acrobat XI (cannot say about other versions) as shown in this link. Here are the steps for this post.

  1. Create New Action using Action Wizard

    enter image description here

  2. Add Reduce File Size Tool. Make sure you uncheck Prompt User as needed enter image description here

  3. Add Save tool from Save & Export. In Specify Settings make sure you have the needed settings (rename or overwrite) enter image description here

  4. Save the Processing Tool you created enter image description here

  5. You will see your tool under Actions in Tools (right side tabs)

    enter image description here

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  • This does not work in the "Adobe Acrobat XI Standard" (see the question title and the answer by Max Wyss) as Actions are a feature that require the non-Standard version of Adobe Acrobat XI. Oct 8, 2018 at 12:48
  • ok. did not know there are two flavors for each version.
    – Stat-R
    Oct 8, 2018 at 15:42
  • No problem: some people do have the "big" Acrobat Reader XI package, so the screen shots and steps will help those people (so your answer is a very good addition to the terse one by Max Wyss). Could you add the exact Adobe Acrobat XI edition you have in a screenshot? Note to self: the "Standard" edition comes bundled with a lot of scanners, but the bigger edition comes with many of the Adobe subscriptions. Oct 8, 2018 at 16:53
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You can Use AutoIt 3 to automate this.

Use the included recorder. Start in File manager with the first file. Enter, sleep, alt+f... Last step alt+F4, to get back to the file manager. Then Cursor down, to get to the next file.

If they are in different folders, use Windows search as the starting point.

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