xargs has additional flexibility...try using the "replace string" parameter

So do:

cat list.txt | xargs -i cat "{}" | pdftk output -

The curly braces indicate where the input goes...in this case, between the quotes. Should handle those pesky spaces for you.

Looks like this will dump a ton of pdf content to stdout....is that what you really want?

On Tue, Mar 4, 2008 at 7:22 PM, Craig White <craigwhite@azapple.com> wrote:

Again, that works but it fails because the PDF includes on the last file. As I said, I don't think an xargs thing is going to work at all because as the man page states...the '-' option is to pass only a single file via stdin.

Craig

On Tue, 2008-03-04 at 19:10 -0700, Charles Jones wrote:
> Ah those darn spaces sure cause problems :)  Give this a try:
>
> $ cat I-A-files.txt | sed 's/ /\\ /g' | xargs cat | pdftk - output
> I-a.pdf verbose
>
> It works for my test case:
> $ cat file.txt
> file with spaces
> some other file
>
> $ cat "file with spaces"
> This is the contents of a file with spaces
> $ cat some\ other\ file
> This is some other file
>
> $ cat file.txt | sed 's/ /\\ /g' |xargs cat
> This is the contents of a file with spaces
> This is some other file
>
> Probably a more elegant way to do it, but I'm late for dinner :-)
>
> -Charles
>
>
> Craig White wrote:
> > That doesn't seem to work. I quoted the part of the man page that the
> > '-' is used to pass only a single PDF into pdftk via stdin and thus the
> > xargs thing seems not to fly.
> >
> > $ cat I-A-files.txt | xargs -0 pdftk cat output I-A.pdf verbose
> > Error: No input files.  Exiting.
> > Errors encountered.  No output created.
> > Done.  Input errors, so no output created.
> >
> > Thanks
> >
> > Craig
> >
> > On Tue, 2008-03-04 at 17:24 -0700, Charles Jones wrote:
> >
> >> Give this a try:
> >>
> >> cat /path/to/filenames_file.xt |xargs pdftk
> >>
> >> -Charles
> >>
> >> Craig White wrote:
> >>
> >>> I have an awkward situation with pdftk
> >>>
> >>> I have a file with filenames that I want to pass to pdftk as input
> >>> files.
> >>>
> >>> according to the man page...
> >>> <input PDF files | - | PROMPT>
> >>>   A list of the input PDF files. If you plan to combine these PDFs
> >>>   (without using handles) then list files in the  order  you  want
> >>>   them combined.  Use - to pass a single PDF into pdftk via stdin.
> >>>
> >>> and thus, this doesn't work...
> >>>
> >>> pdftk `cat "/mypath/to/I-A-files.txt"` cat output I-A.pdf verbose
> >>>
> >>> fails on spaces within the paths/filenames in that file.
> >>>
> >>> I have tried both escaping the spaces with \ and enclosing each path
> >>> within a double quote but neither works.
> >>>
> >>> I have also tried (which fails)...
> >>>
> >>> $ cat "/mypath/to/I-A-files.txt" | pdftk - cat output I-A.pdf verbose
> >>> Error: Failed to open PDF file:
> >>>    -
> >>> Errors encountered.  No output created.
> >>> Done.  Input errors, so no output created.
> >>> sh-3.2$ ls -l
> >>> total 4440
> >>> -rw-r--r-- 1 craig administrative      10 2008-03-04 15:15 doc_toc.html
> >>> -rw-r--r-- 1 craig administrative    1898 2008-03-04 15:30 I-A-files.txt
> >>>
> >>> Any suggestions on this?
> >>>
> >>> T
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