Png2PdfGUI - A graphical user interface to png2pdf

Overview

The Java application Png2PdfGUI provides a graphical user interface to the png2pdf program. To convert PNG files to PDF you have to perform the following tasks:

Choose the directory containing the PNG files.
Set conversion options.
Run png2pdf.
Exit the application.

These main tasks can be performed using buttons in the button bar or using menu entries.

Requirements

To use the Png2PdfGUI you must have the png2pdf program installed. Normally this conditions is fullfilled because Png2PdfGUI and png2pdf are in the same package, so they are installed at the same time.

A Java run-time environment (Java 5) must be installed. Previous versions are not sufficient to run Png2PdfGUI.

Starting the program

On Windows systems

In a prompt box run

java.exe -cp c:\programs\krause\lib\png2pdf.jar;c:\programs\krause\lib\dklibsj.jar Png2PdfGUI

You possibly need to replace c:\programs\krause by another directory, depending on your decisions during installation process.

Once you have verified the program starts correctly you can create shortcuts either on the desktop or in the start menu. For shortcuts you should use javaw.exe instead of java.exe.

On Unix/Linux systems

Run

java -c /usr/local/lib/png2pdf.jar:/usr/local/lib/dklibsj.jar Png2PdfGUI

to start the program.

Program appearance at start

When running the program for the first time the main window looks like this:

Choosing a directory

Use either the "Choose directory" button or the menu entry "Png2pdf / Directory" to choose the directory.

The directory chooser dialog appears.

Navigate to the directory containing your PNG files and confirm the selection.
The new working directory is shown in the main window.

You can also attempt to use drag'n'drop to drag a directory from Windows explorer or Nautilus into the Png2PdfGUI main window. For other Unix/Linux desktops it is not known whether drag'n'drop works, just try it.

Set png2pdf options

Use either the "Set options" button in the button bar or the "Png2pdf / Options" menu entry to set conversion options.

In the "Png2pdf Options" dialog you have the following choices:

PDF format version
You can either produce PDF version 1.2, 1.3 or 1.4. Smaller version numbers will be compatible to older PDF viewers, larger version numbers require a recent viewer but provide more PDF features.
Run in make mode
If make mode is enabled the program checks the modification timestamps of source and destination files. A destination file is up to date if the file exists and was last modified after the last modification of the source file. A conversion is only run for those sources for which there is no up-to-date destination file.
Show file names while processing
The status message can either simply show "running" while a conversion is running or show the file name for each file currently processed. When processing directories containing many files showing each file name will show you that the program is still alive.
When showing file names a new png2pdf process is started for each conversion. If you choose to see the simple "running" status message one process is running on the directory doing all the conversions, this is faster than starting a new process for each file to convert.
Image interpolation
This check box sets the image interpolation flag in output files. Viewer programs are recommended to do image interpolation, this is usefull if small images are scaled up.
Alpha channel handling
Here you can decide how to handle alpha channel data if such data is present in a PNG file.
- Input alpha channel expresses transparency
  Normally you should leave this checkbox turned off because the alpha channel expresses opacity.
- Mix against a background color
  You can choose to mix foreground color (the PNG pixel RGB value) against the background color depending on the opacity/transparency value of the pixel. The background color is contained in the background chunk in the PNG file.
  Some PNG files containing an alpha channel do not contain a background chunk, so it is up to the user to choose a background color. The "Choose background color" entry allows to choose a default background color to use if no background chunk is available in the PNG file. Just click on the color-view rectangle to select a color.
  If you always want to use the specified background color (you want to ignore background chunks from the PNG file) enable the checkbox "Prefer specified default color...".
- Create image mask
  In addition to mixing -- or instead of mixing -- you can convert the alpha channel into an image mask. The normal mask level is to paint all opacity>0 pixels and to mask out all opacity=0 pixels.
  Enable "Use inverted mask levels" to paint only opacity=full pixels and to mask out all opacity<full pixels.
- Write alpha channel to output
  You can also write alpha channel data to PDF output (for PDF version >= 1.4).
Note: Some of these options are not available for all PDF versions.
Some of the options are exclusive, i.e. you can not use mixing and alpha channel writing together (the opacity factors from the alpha channel would be applied twice: once in mixing and once by the PDF viewer when showing the file).

Running a conversion

Use the "Run png2pdf" button from the button bar or the "Png2pdf / Run" menu entry to start a conversion.

While the conversion is running the status text color changes to red and the text changes to "Running". If you decided to see file names the text changes to "Processing ...".

After all conversions are done the color changes back to green and the text changes back to "Ready".

Exiting the program

Use either the "Exit the GUI" button in the button bar or the "Png2pdf / Exit" menu entry to exit the program.