Converting a Fixed Layout EPUB to Searchable PDF [Graphical Guide]

[Mercury's Priest]

Graphical Guide on IMGUR: https://imgur.com/a/XKCo7mW

Step 1: Open the Fixed Layout EPUB with Calibre's integrated E-Book Viewer



At least in my case, the book had a "small text problem", which made it uncomfortable to read, and if i zoomed-in, the text would end looking pretty weird



Step 2: Use the Printing option, in order to get a .PDF file



This .PDF file will be pretty nice and zoomable, however for some reason the resulting file will have big, enormous white margins, so we have to find a way to remove these



Step 3: Buy a copy of ABBY FineReader 15 (or search for a equivalent open source/freeware option) and install it. Then, look for the program on the start menu



Step 4: Click "Open PDF Document"



STEP 5: Open the PDF File



Step 6: Look for the "Crop" tool. Select the real page's area, and choose the option to crop all pages at once



Step 7: Save the file to a new Searchable PDF file



Step 8: Admire the Final Result. The text looks way bigger than on the Fixed Layout EPUB File, plus the PDF is perfectly zoomable and searchable!

[BetterRed]

I moved this from the calibre forum because it is more about the PDF format that calibre

BTW all your embedded imaged are too big, see Guideline #9.

BR

[Mercury's Priest]

I need to replace the first, last and second images with these links:

First: https://i.imgur.com/D3Ix0b3.png

Second: https://i.imgur.com/l8zXztp.png

Last: https://i.imgur.com/iafYQ58.png

And the main link with this: https://imgur.com/gallery/SJ7s4lf

I can't edit the post for some reason (so I can't edit the image size either)

Regards

[Tooti]

Hi everyone,

This still seems to be the best solution we have yet. But I am facing a problem. When printing the book, the resulting PDF seems to show some encoding issues (it is a book in French), which makes some characters appear incorrectly.
Unfortunately, Calibre's print function does not have feature encoding option…

[JSWolf]

The first post in this thread is why it's best to attached images and then put up a thumbnail where you want the image to be. This way we don't get missing images or images that won't work for whatever reason.