how to convert pdf to pages

If your goal is to convert a PDF that is predominantly text, or rich text to a text, or RTF document, that Pages '09 and Pages v6.2 can open, then that is a relatively straightforward task. There is an Automator action that does this.

But, to convert a PDF with rich text, links, tables, artwork, and images into a Pages document — and retain the original PDF appearance is impossible with free tools, and difficult for paid applications to pull off. I have used some of these so-called “magical” paid PDF to Pages converters, and you can be prepared for hours of reformatting productivity loss in the output document. This is because the content of a PDF is a quagmire of internal references to bits and pieces of non-contiguous objects instead of what we visually perceive as a PDF document. Reordering that mess into an original word processing document format is very tough to do right programmatically.

What you can do, is use the Automator action to get to the RTF document, and open that in the two Pages versions mentioned above that accept RTF. You will likely need to refer to the PDF for accurate formatting. If you need to get original DPI images, artwork, and tables from the PDF, then I recommend that you open it in the most recent version of the free LibreOffice (currently 5.4.1.2). It will open with the LO Draw tool, and you can then select the individual non-text items to extract, and then later replace these in the RTF document.

There simply is no mash a button, get a result — that does not require additional effort on your part.

There is no out of the box functionalities and in general is not easy (and really depend on the nature of the PDF).

I see that there are solution in the Mac AppStore like this PDF to Pages Free on the Mac App Store but I have no direct experience and truth be told, I'm a bit skeptic 🙂

If you have the full version of Adobe Acrobat, it's fairly easy, although the results are not always exactly what you'd expect.

Adobe also offers conversion software:

Export PDF to Word or Excel online | Adobe Export PDF

Connie Wisley wrote:

Do you have to convert PDF to editable Pages? Is it OK if save the PDF file as image in Pages. If OK, you can try following:

1. Open an existing Pages file to launch Pages

2. Drag and drop PDF file to Pages. You will need to drag and drop only one PDF page to blank Pages page, otherwise, the previous page will be overlapped.

3. Go to File and Save it.

What is your connection to Cisdem?

"I work with two apple computers and two PC and they have different software. My new macbookpro has the silly pages program that can only be open with apple machinery. I have Word with my iMac but I can only access it on the week ends. The college where I work has provided me with an online Word facility but I have to go to all the parabel of converting that ruins the documents.

Non compatible programs mean MONEY... which seems to be what Apple is all about. Shame!"

This entire paragraph makes a good argument for your buying and using the home and student version of Microsoft Office for Mac. The package includes MS Word, MS Excel and MS Power Point software, all of which use the same file formats as the Windows versions of the same applications. No more conversions needed—documents saved from MS Word for Mac are in the same file format as MS Word for Office.

If "mean MONEY" translates to "object to paying for MS Word", try one of the free to download and use LibreOffice or Apache OpenOffice. Both request, but do not require, donations to assist with future development. Both are designed as replacements for the MS Office applications. Both have significant learning curves for someone coming directly from Pages, but that's also true of Word. The links are to the home pages or the download pages of each site.

Regards,

Barry

Sots62 wrote:

a paying application that is not very good.... Mmmmm Thank you anyway! Have a nice day

The problem is not that the app isn't good. The problem is that PDFs aren't designed to be turned into word documents. It's a sort of reverse engineering. VikingOSX explains it better.

You can export Pages documents to Word. I suspect the results will be much better than printing to a PDF and converting it. However, it sounds as if the simplest solution would be to get Word on your MacBook Pro.

What language do you speak so we can explain this better to you?

pdf files are meant to be read on many different OSes and are not meant to be edited. They are digital paper.

Why are you trying to convert them to .pages files anyway?

Why do you think you have to use Pages if you don't like it. There are literally dozens of word processing Apps available on the Mac, Quite a few free or very cheap.

Peter

You're welcome 🙂