Searching and Redacting Text
Power PDF Advanced lets you search and redact specific words or phrases from an open PDF document, selected documents in a Portfolio, an entire PDF package or Portfolio, or in all PDF documents found in a specified folder or subfolder.
The program allows four search types as the basis for redacting:
search a single word or phrase
search multiple words or phrases
search flexibly like internet search engines
search by pre-defined patterns
search by custom written patterns (arbitrary masks)
When performing a folder search, additional criteria can be specified by clicking the Advanced button and clicking on cells in the columns Key, Operation and Value. For instance:
[Keyword] [includes] ['Kofax']
[Author] [includes] ['John Doe']
See Search dialog box.
To search and mark text for redaction in one or more PDF documents
Select Security > Redaction->Search and Redact.
In the Look In field, specify whether to search in the current PDF, multiple PDFs within a package, an entire PDF package or Portfolio, or all PDF files in a specified folder. Click Browse in the top-level folder list to specify a sub-folder.
Select a search type: single word or phrase, multiple words or phrases, fuzzy search, pattern, or mask. See Search dialog box for details.
To search a single word or phrase, or to run a fuzzy search, enter any words, word fragments, or phrases of interest.
To search multiple words or phrases, click Select Words and compile a search list.
To search by pattern, select the desired pattern from the drop-down list.
To search by custom-defined pattern, enter the pattern using the syntax shown.Set the search filters such as Match Case or Match whole word only as you prefer.
For a single-word search these options are in the main panel, for multi-word searches, they are in the dialog box called by Select Words. These are not available for pattern and mask searches.Click Search and Redact.
Check the search result list. To refine your search, click New Search and modify search filters appropriately.
In the search result list, check all items you want to mark for redaction. If you want to mark all items, click Select All.
Under Redaction Mark Options, select any of the following options:
Mark whole word(s) for redaction: This is the default option, which marks all characters in the resulting words.
Mark partial word(s) for redaction: Select to mark only a part of the words found. The Settings dialog appears. Select from the options below:
Mark: Select this option to specify how many characters to mark from the beginning or end of the word.
Mark from: Select this option to specify the starting and ending character positions to mark.
Click Mark Selected Results for Redaction. All checked search results will be marked for pending redaction.
If you selected The entire PDF Portfolio or Selected folder in the Look In field, then the Output Options dialog box appears. Set the output folder and file naming options, then click OK.
To apply redaction to marked items
You can also apply redaction one-by-one, using the Apply command in the context menu of a redaction mark.
To apply the redaction on all marks in all opened PDF documents, select Security > Redaction > Apply Redaction. This will permanently and unrecoverably render unreadable all text and areas marked for redaction – both as a result of a search and manual selection.
The Apply dialog box repeats the warning that redaction cannot be undone. Click Apply to confirm and perform redaction in all opened documents.
The topic Redacting
Content explains how to redact text and images by selection and also
shows the appearance of marked and redacted text.
Note
Redaction cannot be undone once it is applied. To avoid mistakes, we strongly advise you to make a copy of the original PDF files before you perform redaction; or save a redacted PDF as a new file with a different name and/or location.