When downloading multiple pieces of correspondence from PAIR in a single download, the USPTO usually outputs the documents into a single PDF file with each piece of correspondence seperately bookmarked.

For an easy way to split this multi-part PDF file into a PDF file for each bookmark, I wrote a simple batch file and helper program that achieves that with the help of open source pdftk.

The batch file first calls pdftk to dump the bookmark data including bookmark names and starting page numbers.  Then, it parses that output using the helper program to generate another batch file that calls pdftk to split each of the bookmarked sections into separate files named the same as the bookmarked section.

You can call the batch file like:

pdfBmrkSplit.bat <PDF file to be split>

For example,

pdfBmrkSplit.bat 12345678.pdf

The solution isn’t fully polished.  For example, it’s command line-based and assumes: that pdftk and the helper program are either found in the current directory or in the command search path; the bookmarks are all the same level (which is true of most, if not all, PDF files from PAIR); and that the bookmarks all have unique names.

You can download pdftk at: http://www.pdfhacks.com/pdftk/pdftk-1.12.exe.zip and the batch and helper program at: http://www.patenttechtips.org/downloads/pdfBmrkSplit.zip Source code is included.

Unzip the files into the same directory.

Additional uses of pdfTK will be discussed in future posts.