Installing Img2pdf Software on Debian Linux
Posted 01-01-2009 at 09:22 AM by wmromine
I had a need to get the Img2pdf software from www.freshmeat.net to run on my Debian 3.1 (Sarge) linux machine. This software is used to convert a folder of single page image files to a single pdf document. Installing the img2pdf software turned out to be a very difficult task for me since I am not familiar with programming. The hardship could have been significantly reduced if better installation documentation were available, but that did not appear to be the case. Since I was able to successfully get the img2pdf software to install and run, I thought I would share my experience with the hope that it may help someone else.
Img2pdf software itself, is rather simplistic, but it has many software dependencies that must be met before it will run. The first dependency is BerkeleyDB database software. Debian has already compiled this software as a package (libdb4.3) and it was part of the default installation. But you also need to install the companion development package, libdb4.3-dev. Once installed, the next dependency, Panda, can be addressed.
Before attempting to install Panda to Debian Sarge Linux, it is critical to have all of the required packages installed.
List of known required Debian Packages:
autoconf, automake, libtool, lib6c, libdb4.3, libdb4.3-dev, libjpeg62, libjpeg62-dev, libpng12, libpng12-dev, libtiff4, libtiff4-dev, zlib1g, zlib1g-dev
There are other necessary packages such as gcc, but they were installed as part of the default packages. None of the packages ending with -dev were installed as part of my default installation. If you are have problems as I did, you probably do not have all of the required packages installed.
Once the Panda tar file is expanded, there is a folder called, "config". This folder contains some required symbolic links that do not work in Debian.
Go to the .../panda-.0.5.4/config folder and issue the following commands as root:
rm config.sub
rm config.guess
rm ltmain.sh
ln -s /usr/share/libtool/config.sub config.sub
ln -s /usr/share/libtool/config.guess config.guess
ln -s /usr/share/libtool/ltmain.sh ltmain.sh
This will generate the correct links for Debian. Next, go back to the default panda directory (.../panda-0.5.4) and issue the following commands:
./configure
make
make install
The panda files are saved to the .../panda-0.5.4 folder and the library files are also saved to /usr/local/lib folder. Installing panda is a prerequisite to installing the software img2pdf. You must have a successful install of Panda before attempting to install img2pdf. Once Panda is installed, I created symbolic links for the panda files in the /usr/local/lib folder to the /usr/lib folder, which is where the libraries are for libjpeg, libpng, libtiff and libz. There is probably an easier way to do this, but it will simplify the running of the img2pdf make file.
After I did the above steps, I was able to generate all of the dependencies required by img2pdf. The next step is to untar the img2pdf sofware. The readme file indicates that you need to modify the img2pdf makefile to point to the location of the dependency libraries. I changed the reference from /usr/local/lib to /usr/lib, and then ran the makefile. Apparently, two executable files are created. I received some error messages for the static file. The img2pdf executable file that was created was then copied to the /usr/local/bin folder.
I then followed the instructions to use the img2pdf software. The software successfully created a single pdf file from 118 image files.
If others have successfully used this software, I would be interested in hearing about your experience. This is really a valuable software for those who are involved in archiving large volumes of documents. I am looking forward to putting it to use.
Img2pdf software itself, is rather simplistic, but it has many software dependencies that must be met before it will run. The first dependency is BerkeleyDB database software. Debian has already compiled this software as a package (libdb4.3) and it was part of the default installation. But you also need to install the companion development package, libdb4.3-dev. Once installed, the next dependency, Panda, can be addressed.
Before attempting to install Panda to Debian Sarge Linux, it is critical to have all of the required packages installed.
List of known required Debian Packages:
autoconf, automake, libtool, lib6c, libdb4.3, libdb4.3-dev, libjpeg62, libjpeg62-dev, libpng12, libpng12-dev, libtiff4, libtiff4-dev, zlib1g, zlib1g-dev
There are other necessary packages such as gcc, but they were installed as part of the default packages. None of the packages ending with -dev were installed as part of my default installation. If you are have problems as I did, you probably do not have all of the required packages installed.
Once the Panda tar file is expanded, there is a folder called, "config". This folder contains some required symbolic links that do not work in Debian.
Go to the .../panda-.0.5.4/config folder and issue the following commands as root:
rm config.sub
rm config.guess
rm ltmain.sh
ln -s /usr/share/libtool/config.sub config.sub
ln -s /usr/share/libtool/config.guess config.guess
ln -s /usr/share/libtool/ltmain.sh ltmain.sh
This will generate the correct links for Debian. Next, go back to the default panda directory (.../panda-0.5.4) and issue the following commands:
./configure
make
make install
The panda files are saved to the .../panda-0.5.4 folder and the library files are also saved to /usr/local/lib folder. Installing panda is a prerequisite to installing the software img2pdf. You must have a successful install of Panda before attempting to install img2pdf. Once Panda is installed, I created symbolic links for the panda files in the /usr/local/lib folder to the /usr/lib folder, which is where the libraries are for libjpeg, libpng, libtiff and libz. There is probably an easier way to do this, but it will simplify the running of the img2pdf make file.
After I did the above steps, I was able to generate all of the dependencies required by img2pdf. The next step is to untar the img2pdf sofware. The readme file indicates that you need to modify the img2pdf makefile to point to the location of the dependency libraries. I changed the reference from /usr/local/lib to /usr/lib, and then ran the makefile. Apparently, two executable files are created. I received some error messages for the static file. The img2pdf executable file that was created was then copied to the /usr/local/bin folder.
I then followed the instructions to use the img2pdf software. The software successfully created a single pdf file from 118 image files.
If others have successfully used this software, I would be interested in hearing about your experience. This is really a valuable software for those who are involved in archiving large volumes of documents. I am looking forward to putting it to use.
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I wrote this article sometime, ago. Since then, I upgraded my OS from Debian Sarge to Lenny to Squeeze and now, Wheezy. Since this article, I discovered that Debian has a pre-packaged software called, gscan2pdf. This graphical software package greatly simplifies the scanning of multiple documents and creating a single pdf file. I use this program all the time and it works great. If you want to save yourself a lot of effort, this is the way to go. Using this package with another package called, pdfmod, provides me with many of the same functions I routinely utilize in Adobe Acrobat Pro at work.Posted 08-15-2013 at 08:25 PM by wmromine 
