A terminal-based PDF utility tool for merging, splitting, compressing, rotating, encrypting, and decrypting PDFs.

Installation

To install dependencies:

bun install

Setup

First-time setup (creates Python virtual environment and installs backend dependencies):

bun run setup

Usage

To run:

bun dev

Or use the unified dev script:

bun dev:all     # Setup (if needed) + run UI
bun dev:ui      # Run UI only
bun dev:backend # Setup backend only

Release Bundle (one command for users)

Build a local release bundle:

bun run release:bundle

Verify bundle integrity/executables:

bun run release:verify

Create versioned release artifact + checksum:

bun run release:package

One command for full release flow:

bun run release:all

Notes:

• First backend build may download Python packaging dependencies (pyinstaller + backend deps).
• For offline environments, preinstall backend deps in backend/.venv, then run with PDFZEN_BACKEND_OFFLINE=1 bun run release:bundle.

Bundle output:

• release/bin/pdfzen - launcher command
• release/lib/pdfzen-ui - compiled Bun executable
• release/lib/pdfzen-backend - packaged Python backend executable
• release/artifacts/*.tar.gz - packaged release archive
• release/artifacts/*.sha256 - SHA-256 checksum for archive

Run the bundled app:

./release/bin/pdfzen

Features

• Merge PDFs: Combine multiple PDF files into one
• Split PDF: Split a PDF into multiple files by pages, ranges, or intervals
• Compress PDF: Reduce PDF file size with image optimization
• Rotate PDF: Rotate pages in a PDF document
• Delete Pages: Remove specific pages from a PDF
• Protect PDF: Add password protection and permissions
• Decrypt PDF: Remove password protection from PDFs
• PDF to Images: Convert PDF pages to PNG/JPG images
• Images to PDF: Combine images into a single PDF

Keyboard Shortcuts

Navigation

• Tab / Shift+Tab - Navigate between UI elements
• ↑ / ↓ - Navigate up/down through elements
• j / k - Vim-style navigation (down/up)
• Enter - Execute focused action (press button, submit input)

General

• Ctrl+D - Toggle debug panel to view application state
• ESC (double press) - Return to main menu from a tool

File List Actions

When navigating file lists, you can tab through:

• Move Up (↑) - Reorder file up in the list
• Move Down (↓) - Reorder file down in the list
• Remove (X) - Remove file from the list

Adding Files

• Click on the file list area to open file picker
• Drag & drop files into the terminal