Merge PDF files and save their index (xref-Table?)

Question

I want to merge two PDF files while maintaining the index (xref-table) of both files.

I wanted to write my dissertation at LaTeX, with the exception of an attractive and complex cover page. Now I want to combine the title page of my dissertation with the content, but I could not do this job by saving the index using the following tools:

• pdftk and
• Presented in Lossless Merge PDF Files (PHP) .

The PDF Toolkit (pdftk) provides the dump_data command, with which you can retrieve metadata information, including bookmarks. This data can be transferred to a pdf file using the "update_info" command, which works, except for bookmarks.

Can someone out there give me advice on how to do this?

Thanks for helping me, Rainer

Answer 1

If you want to somehow update the PDF file without changing the source table or the Xref stream, you will need to save the changes to the document as an incremental update. This will result in any changes to the document that will be made in the update section at the bottom of the file. Here the diagram visually demonstrates this:

If you are not using incremental updating, then when the PDF is saved, it will be overwritten and a new table or Xref stream will be created.

You will need to find a library that supports incremental updates.