JPKCom DB

PDF Tools — Tips & Tricks

Tricks for PDF Tools: privacy as the selling point, the 50 MB limit, Simple vs. Rich HTML, searchable text, and combining with other JPKCom tools.

Back to the overview: PDF Tools · Open the tool live: www.jpkc.com/tools/pdf/

The Manual explains every feature, the Examples show the workflows. This page is about what both assume but rarely state: why privacy is the real argument here, which limits you should know, and when which conversion path is the right one.

Privacy is the selling point here

The biggest difference from most online PDF services: your files never leave your device. There is no upload and no server processing your PDFs — every operation runs locally in your browser via JavaScript.

  • Sensitive documents are safe. Contracts, payslips, HR records, internal reports, completed applications — what is never uploaded cannot sit on someone else's server or be intercepted. With classic "merge PDF online" services, your document lands on their infrastructure.
  • Works offline. Once the libraries are loaded, the actual work needs no connection — the processing happens in the browser.
  • No account, no install. No login, no desktop software, no data trail.

If someone asks whether an online PDF tool is "okay" for a confidential file, that is precisely the answer: a purely client-side tool like this one is, an upload service is not.

The 50 MB limit and large files

Files may be up to 50 MB; larger ones are rejected. This is not a server limit but a safeguard for your browser's memory — all processing happens locally, after all.

  • Very large or page-heavy PDFs may take noticeably longer to process in the browser or, depending on the device, hit memory limits. An older laptop struggles with a 300-page scan more than a current desktop.
  • Workaround via Split: if you only need to work on part of a huge PDF, first extract the relevant pages (Split) and continue with the smaller excerpt.
  • Shrink images first. High-resolution photos bloat an Images → PDF heavily. For non-PNG/JPEG formats (WebP, GIF, BMP, TIFF) the tool rasterises via a canvas anyway and caps the edge length at 4000 px — so very large images add no value but cost memory.

Simple HTML or Rich HTML? The decision that matters

The Convert tab offers two HTML paths that differ fundamentally — the choice decides the quality of your result:

  • Simple HTML (pdfmake) translates the markup into real PDF text. The result is searchable, copyable and compact — but CSS styling is ignored. Use this when the content matters and the layout can be plain.
  • Rich HTML (html2pdf.js) renders the page visually, like a browser — with CSS, colours, flexbox, images. In return the output is raster: the page goes into the PDF as an image, the text is not selectable or searchable, and the file gets larger.

Rule of thumb: searchable text → Simple HTML or Markdown. Pixel-perfect look → Rich HTML. For Rich HTML, the Quality Scale option controls the resolution: 1× is fast, 2× is the default, 3× is for print — higher scaling means sharper, but slower and larger.

Searchable text, OCR and scans

  • Markdown and Simple HTML produce real text — you can search and select text in the result later. That is the invisible but big advantage over image PDFs.
  • There is no OCR. The Text feature (in the Viewer & Editor) and text extraction only read an existing text layer. A pure scan PDF without a text layer therefore returns almost nothing — that is not a bug but the absence of text recognition. For such cases you need a dedicated OCR tool.
  • The Info "Tagged" field comes from the PDF's AcroForm flag and says more about the presence of form fields than about a true tagged-PDF structure. Do not read too much real accessibility into it.

Small tricks

  • Reuse Creator templates. If you regularly build similar documents (quotes, minutes), save the structure once via Export JSON and load it next time via Import JSON — including embedded images. That saves re-clicking it all.
  • Duplicate blocks instead of rebuilding. In the Creator every block has a Duplicate button; a fully formatted table or paragraph is there a second time in seconds.
  • Order matters when merging. The merged PDF strictly follows the table order — sort before clicking Merge All, not after.
  • Fit Mode per image. In Images → PDF you can set the Fit Mode not only globally but per image — handy when a landscape photo needs "Fill" and a portrait scan needs "Fit".

Combining with other JPKCom tools

PDF Tools convert existing input into PDF — and you best produce that input in the matching specialist tool:

  • Markdown Editor — write Markdown with a live preview, then convert it to PDF here in the Convert tab (searchable text).
  • WYSIWYG Editor — build HTML visually, then convert it as Simple HTML (searchable) or Rich HTML (pixel-perfect).
  • Graphic Editor — crop, scale and convert images to the right format before bundling them with Images → PDF.

More context: the overview for the big picture, the Manual for every feature, and the Examples for the step-by-step workflows. You can try everything directly in the tool.