PDFOPEN(1)                                                          PDFOPEN(1)



NAME
       pdfopen, pdfclose - open or close a PDF file viewer

SYNOPSIS
       pdfopen [ options ]  [ --file ]  file.pdf
       pdfclose [ --file ]  file.pdf

OPTIONS
       -h, --help, -?
               output help and exit.

       -v, --version, -V
               output the version number and exit.

       -p <n>, --page <n>
               when  starting  the  viewer,  display  page <n> of the document
               (notes: not all viewers support this feature, and even in those
               cases  this  option  only  has effect when the document is ini-
               tially loaded).  This option is over-ridden by -g.

       -g <named destination>, --goto <named destination>
               when starting the viewer, display the page of the document con-
               taining  the  named destination (notes: not all viewers support
               this feature, and even in those  cases  this  option  only  has
               effect when the document is initially loaded).

       -r, --reset_focus
               after  sending commands to the PDF viewer, attempt to reset the
               input focus to the window which had focus before  the  commands
               were sent.

       -viewer, --viewer <ar9|ar9-tab|ar8|ar7|ar5|xpdf|evince>
               use  (respectively)  Adobe  Reader  9  (in a new window), Adobe
               Reader 9 (in a new tab of a running AR9, if any), Adobe  Reader
               8,  Adobe  Reader  7, Adobe Reader 5, xpdf or evince as the PDF
               viewer program.  Adobe Reader  9  (in  a  new  window)  is  the
               default.

RATIONALE
       At  certain  points  of  TeX document preparation, many people repeat a
       "edit-compile-view" cycle.  Since PDF viewers such as  Adobe's  Acrobat
       Reader  ("acroread")  do not automatically refresh the display when the
       PDF file changes, this cycle can be more cumbersome than desired.   The
       pdfopen  program  provides the ability to automate the reloading of the
       PDF document when it is changed.

       Note: there seems to be little need for pdfclose under GNU/Linux, since
       (unlike  the  situation  for MS windows) acroread does not lock the PDF
       file, which would prevent pdftex (or a DVI to PDF converter) from  cre-
       ating  a new version of the PDF output file.  However, pdfclose is pro-
       vided in case someone finds it useful.

DESCRIPTION
       pdfopen searches for an instance of  the  specified  (or  default)  PDF
       viewer  displaying  the  specified  PDF  file.   If there is already an
       instance of the given viewer displaying the given file, the  viewer  is
       instructed  to  reload the file.  If no such instance is found, pdfopen
       attempts to run the specified viewer on the specified document.

       The default viewer is "acroread", which could start any one of a number
       of  versions  of Acrobat Reader, depending on what is installed on your
       system.  However, the commands to reload the current document vary from
       one  version  of  acroread to another; consequently, if you are using a
       version of acroread other than AR9, you should explicitly  specify  the
       viewer program.

       This version of pdfopen accepts the following viewer options:
       ar9, ar9-tab, ar8, ar7, ar5, xpdf, and evince.
       The  difference between ar9 and ar9-tab is significant when there is no
       instance of AR9 already displaying the  requested  document.   In  this
       situation,  while ar9 will request acroread to create a new instance of
       acroread (and thus open a new window) by using  the  -openInNewInstance
       argument,  ar9-tab  starts  acroread without this argument; if there is
       already an instance of acroread running, a new tab will be opened in an
       existing window.

       pdfclose searches for one of the above PDF viewers displaying the given
       file and instructs the viewer to "close" the window.   In  most  cases,
       the  PDF  viewer continues to run, possibly now displaying just a blank
       window.  (This  behaviour  varies  somewhat  from  one  PDF  viewer  to
       another.)

PORTABILITY AND AVAILABILITY
       These  programs  have been tested on Slackware64 Version 14.1 and a few
       other versions / distributions of GNU/Linux.  The  code  is  reasonably
       generic  and should work out of the box using most recent X11 implemen-
       tations.  (Reports to the contrary are welcome,  particularly  if  they
       come with robust fixes.)

       These programs are designed for X11-based systems.  If you somehow find
       compiled versions of these programs on a system  using  another  window
       system, they are very unlikely to be of any use to you.

       Source  and binaries of the programs can be downloaded from CTAN://sup-
       port/xpdfopen/ (e.g., http://mirror.ctan.org/support/xpdfopen).

CAVEATS
       If you use ar9-tab to reload the  PDF  document  and  the  instance  of
       acroread  with  the  given  document is currently displaying some other
       document, the command causes your document to  be  displayed,  but  not
       reloaded.

       pdfopen works by looking for a window with a name (window title) match-
       ing that expected for the given viewer and document.  If for some  rea-
       son  your viewer's window name is not as expected, pdfopen may not work
       for you.

       With at least AR9 and some window managers, using pdfopen to reload the
       document gives focus to the acroread window, even though the mouse cur-
       sor is not necessarily in that window.   This  can  be  annoying.   The
       -reset_focus option can be used to deal with this problem.

AUTHOR
       This  manual  page was written by Jim Diamond <Jim.Diamond@acadiau.ca>.
       I am the current maintainer of the X11 versions  of  pdfopen  and  pdf-
       close.   Report  any bugs you find to me.  Feature enhancement requests
       are welcome, coded enhancements even more so.

       Past authors: Fabrice Popineau wrote the MS-windows versions of pdfopen
       and  pdfclose  upon  which  these programs were originally based.  Taco
       Hoekwater created the GNU/Linux versions, up to Version 0.61 (including
       some  documentation which inspired parts of this man page).  Peter Bre-
       itenlohner has contributed both code and suggestions to versions  later
       than 0.61.



pdfopen 0.86                      2014-05-24                        PDFOPEN(1)
