PDFlib pCOS provides a simple and elegant facility for retrieving any information from a PDF document which is not part of the page contents. For example, PDF metadata, interactive elements (links, form fields, etc.), or page dimensions can easily be queried with pCOS.
With pCOS you can extract a variety of interesting items and create output for different purposes. By processing multiple PDF documents with a single call you can easily create summaries of document info entries, page formats, fonts, or any other property. Combined with tabular output this provides a powerful PDF administration tool.
There are many application scenarios for the PDF Information Retrieval Tool PDFlib pCOS within PDF workflows, but you can also use PDFlib pCOS as a tool for learning or debugging PDF. Here are some typical situations:

Check incoming documents for predefined criteria

Identify problem files in a large collection

Create metadata summaries for document management

quality assurance before publishing documents

document retrieval and repository workflows

summarize the bookmarks

extract components of PDF documents, e.g. ICC profiles

Check PDFs for security problems (JavaScript etc.)

The pCOS retrieval interface is included in other PDFlib GmbH products: if you use PDFlib+PDI, PDFlib Personalization Server, TET or PLOP you also have access to the pCOS interface. If you need access to text or images on the page use our product PDFlib TET for PDF content extraction.

pCOS Cookbook

The pCOS Cookbook is a collection of programming examples which demonstrate the use of pCOS for various PDF retrieval tasks. The Cookbook is available here and includes sample code, input documents and sample output.

Supported Input

PDFlib pCOS supports all flavors of PDF input:

All PDF versions up to Acrobat X, including ISO 32000

Encrypted documents (password may be required)

Sophisticated security model: even if you don’t know the password, you can query certain pieces of information as long as this doesn’t violate the document author’s intentions

Damaged PDF input documents will be repaired if possible

Information Retrieval

PDFlib pCOS offers a simple query interface. With PDFlib pCOS you can extract a variety of interesting items, such as:

Document info entries and XMP metadata

General information: linearization and tagged PDF status, encryption details and permission settings, number of pages and fonts

Fonts with name, embedding status, etc.

Image data, such as bit depth, color space, compression

Color space details

Target URLs and coordinates of Web links

Bookmarks and the corresponding page numbers, e.g. to create a table of contents

Form field data: full field names, contents, position, etc.

Page size, CropBox, page rotation

Status of ISO standards: PDF/X, PDF/A, PDF/UA, PDF/E, and PDF/VT

Geospatial reference information

List or extract file attachments

Layer names, page labels, article threads

Annotation details

List all comments along with the reviewer’s name

Digital signature details: name of signature field(s), signed/unsigned, name of signer, date and reason of signature

Extract ICC output intent profiles from PDF/X or PDF/A documents

Block properties for PDFlib Personalization Server

JavaScript on document, page, annotation, or field level

Output Formats

PDFlib pCOS can create output for different purposes:

Plain text output

Unicode text output in UTF-8 or UTF-16 formats

Tabular output for processing with a spreadsheet/database

Binary data, e.g. ICC profiles or file attachments

User-defined output formats for custom post-processing

pCOS Paths – Simple Syntax for PDF Objects

Instead of getting bogged down by complex tree structures, e.g. for bookmarks or form fields, you can easily access PDF objects by using the simple pCOS path syntax. It offers convenient shortcuts for accessing commonly used PDF objects, such as pages, fonts, bookmarks, form fields etc.

pCOS is available as a programming library (component) for various development environments, and as a command-line tool for batch operations. Both offer similar features, but are suitable for different deployment tasks.

The pCOS programming library is used...

...for integration into desktop or server applications. Examples for using the library with all supported language bindings are included in the pCOS package.

The pCOS command-line tool is suited...

...for batch processing PDF documents. It doesn’t require any programming, but offers powerful command-line options which can be used to integrate it into complex workflows. The pCOS command-line tool extends the features of the library:

Simple retrieval of common PDF elements, such as bookmarks, annotations, metadata, form fields, etc.

Extended mode for querying more complex objects and customizing the output format

Extract data items, such as file attachments, ICC profiles, etc.

Emit information as comma-separated values or a userdefined format for import into a spreadsheet or database

Recursion feature for dumping composite PDF objects, such as dictionaries and arrays

PDFlib pCOS is everywhere – it runs on practically all computing platforms. We offer 32-bit and 64-bit packages for all common flavors of Windows, Mac OS X, Linux and Unix.

The pCOS core is written in highly optimized C and C++ code for maximum performance and small overhead. Via a simple API (Application Programming Interface) the pCOS functionality is accessible from a variety of development environments:

COM for use with VB, ASP,  and many other languages

C and C++

Java, including servlets and Java Application Server

.NET for use with C#, VB.NET, ASP.NET, etc.

Perl

PHP

Python