The invisible text in the OP's sample PDF mostly is made invisible by defining clip paths (outside the bounds of which the text is) and by filling paths (hiding the text underneath). Thus, we have to consider path related instructions during text extraction to ignore that invisible text.
Unfortunately call backs designed for these instructions are not declared in PDFTextStripper or its parent classes LegacyPDFStreamEngine and PDFStreamEngine.
But they are declared in the other major PDFStreamEngine subclass PDFGraphicsStreamEngine, and they are sensibly implemented in PageDrawer.
To make use of this we, therefore, can copy & paste & adapt the PageDrawer implementation into a subclass of PDFTextStripper, e.g. like this:
public class PDFVisibleTextStripper extends PDFTextStripper {
public PDFVisibleTextStripper() throws IOException {
addOperator(new AppendRectangleToPath());
addOperator(new ClipEvenOddRule());
addOperator(new ClipNonZeroRule());
addOperator(new ClosePath());
addOperator(new CurveTo());
addOperator(new CurveToReplicateFinalPoint());
addOperator(new CurveToReplicateInitialPoint());
addOperator(new EndPath());
addOperator(new FillEvenOddAndStrokePath());
addOperator(new FillEvenOddRule());
addOperator(new FillNonZeroAndStrokePath());
addOperator(new FillNonZeroRule());
addOperator(new LineTo());
addOperator(new MoveTo());
addOperator(new StrokePath());
}
@Override
protected void processTextPosition(TextPosition text) {
Matrix textMatrix = text.getTextMatrix();
Vector start = textMatrix.transform(new Vector(0, 0));
Vector end = new Vector(start.getX() + text.getWidth(), start.getY());
PDGraphicsState gs = getGraphicsState();
Area area = gs.getCurrentClippingPath();
if (area == null || (area.contains(start.getX(), start.getY()) && area.contains(end.getX(), end.getY())))
super.processTextPosition(text);
}
private GeneralPath linePath = new GeneralPath();
void deleteCharsInPath() {
for (List<TextPosition> list : charactersByArticle) {
List<TextPosition> toRemove = new ArrayList<>();
for (TextPosition text : list) {
Matrix textMatrix = text.getTextMatrix();
Vector start = textMatrix.transform(new Vector(0, 0));
Vector end = new Vector(start.getX() + text.getWidth(), start.getY());
if (linePath.contains(start.getX(), start.getY()) || linePath.contains(end.getX(), end.getY())) {
toRemove.add(text);
}
}
if (toRemove.size() != 0) {
System.out.println(toRemove.size());
list.removeAll(toRemove);
}
}
}
public final class AppendRectangleToPath extends OperatorProcessor {
@Override
public void process(Operator operator, List<COSBase> operands) throws IOException {
if (operands.size() < 4) {
throw new MissingOperandException(operator, operands);
}
if (!checkArrayTypesClass(operands, COSNumber.class)) {
return;
}
COSNumber x = (COSNumber) operands.get(0);
COSNumber y = (COSNumber) operands.get(1);
COSNumber w = (COSNumber) operands.get(2);
COSNumber h = (COSNumber) operands.get(3);
float x1 = x.floatValue();
float y1 = y.floatValue();
// create a pair of coordinates for the transformation
float x2 = w.floatValue() + x1;
float y2 = h.floatValue() + y1;
Point2D p0 = context.transformedPoint(x1, y1);
Point2D p1 = context.transformedPoint(x2, y1);
Point2D p2 = context.transformedPoint(x2, y2);
Point2D p3 = context.transformedPoint(x1, y2);
// to ensure that the path is created in the right direction, we have to create
// it by combining single lines instead of creating a simple rectangle
linePath.moveTo((float) p0.getX(), (float) p0.getY());
linePath.lineTo((float) p1.getX(), (float) p1.getY());
linePath.lineTo((float) p2.getX(), (float) p2.getY());
linePath.lineTo((float) p3.getX(), (float) p3.getY());
// close the subpath instead of adding the last line so that a possible set line
// cap style isn't taken into account at the "beginning" of the rectangle
linePath.closePath();
}
@Override
public String getName() {
return "re";
}
}
public final class StrokePath extends OperatorProcessor {
@Override
public void process(Operator operator, List<COSBase> operands) throws IOException {
linePath.reset();
}
@Override
public String getName() {
return "S";
}
}
public final class FillEvenOddRule extends OperatorProcessor {
@Override
public void process(Operator operator, List<COSBase> operands) throws IOException {
linePath.setWindingRule(GeneralPath.WIND_EVEN_ODD);
deleteCharsInPath();
linePath.reset();
}
@Override
public String getName() {
return "f*";
}
}
public class FillNonZeroRule extends OperatorProcessor {
@Override
public final void process(Operator operator, List<COSBase> operands) throws IOException {
linePath.setWindingRule(GeneralPath.WIND_NON_ZERO);
deleteCharsInPath();
linePath.reset();
}
@Override
public String getName() {
return "f";
}
}
public final class FillEvenOddAndStrokePath extends OperatorProcessor {
@Override
public void process(Operator operator, List<COSBase> operands) throws IOException {
linePath.setWindingRule(GeneralPath.WIND_EVEN_ODD);
deleteCharsInPath();
linePath.reset();
}
@Override
public String getName() {
return "B*";
}
}
public class FillNonZeroAndStrokePath extends OperatorProcessor {
@Override
public void process(Operator operator, List<COSBase> operands) throws IOException {
linePath.setWindingRule(GeneralPath.WIND_NON_ZERO);
deleteCharsInPath();
linePath.reset();
}
@Override
public String getName() {
return "B";
}
}
public final class ClipEvenOddRule extends OperatorProcessor {
@Override
public void process(Operator operator, List<COSBase> operands) throws IOException {
linePath.setWindingRule(GeneralPath.WIND_EVEN_ODD);
getGraphicsState().intersectClippingPath(linePath);
}
@Override
public String getName() {
return "W*";
}
}
public class ClipNonZeroRule extends OperatorProcessor {
@Override
public void process(Operator operator, List<COSBase> operands) throws IOException {
linePath.setWindingRule(GeneralPath.WIND_NON_ZERO);
getGraphicsState().intersectClippingPath(linePath);
}
@Override
public String getName() {
return "W";
}
}
public final class MoveTo extends OperatorProcessor {
@Override
public void process(Operator operator, List<COSBase> operands) throws IOException {
if (operands.size() < 2) {
throw new MissingOperandException(operator, operands);
}
COSBase base0 = operands.get(0);
if (!(base0 instanceof COSNumber)) {
return;
}
COSBase base1 = operands.get(1);
if (!(base1 instanceof COSNumber)) {
return;
}
COSNumber x = (COSNumber) base0;
COSNumber y = (COSNumber) base1;
Point2D.Float pos = context.transformedPoint(x.floatValue(), y.floatValue());
linePath.moveTo(pos.x, pos.y);
}
@Override
public String getName() {
return "m";
}
}
public class LineTo extends OperatorProcessor {
@Override
public void process(Operator operator, List<COSBase> operands) throws IOException {
if (operands.size() < 2) {
throw new MissingOperandException(operator, operands);
}
COSBase base0 = operands.get(0);
if (!(base0 instanceof COSNumber)) {
return;
}
COSBase base1 = operands.get(1);
if (!(base1 instanceof COSNumber)) {
return;
}
// append straight line segment from the current point to the point
COSNumber x = (COSNumber) base0;
COSNumber y = (COSNumber) base1;
Point2D.Float pos = context.transformedPoint(x.floatValue(), y.floatValue());
linePath.lineTo(pos.x, pos.y);
}
@Override
public String getName() {
return "l";
}
}
public class CurveTo extends OperatorProcessor {
@Override
public void process(Operator operator, List<COSBase> operands) throws IOException {
if (operands.size() < 6) {
throw new MissingOperandException(operator, operands);
}
if (!checkArrayTypesClass(operands, COSNumber.class)) {
return;
}
COSNumber x1 = (COSNumber) operands.get(0);
COSNumber y1 = (COSNumber) operands.get(1);
COSNumber x2 = (COSNumber) operands.get(2);
COSNumber y2 = (COSNumber) operands.get(3);
COSNumber x3 = (COSNumber) operands.get(4);
COSNumber y3 = (COSNumber) operands.get(5);
Point2D.Float point1 = context.transformedPoint(x1.floatValue(), y1.floatValue());
Point2D.Float point2 = context.transformedPoint(x2.floatValue(), y2.floatValue());
Point2D.Float point3 = context.transformedPoint(x3.floatValue(), y3.floatValue());
linePath.curveTo(point1.x, point1.y, point2.x, point2.y, point3.x, point3.y);
}
@Override
public String getName() {
return "c";
}
}
public final class CurveToReplicateFinalPoint extends OperatorProcessor {
@Override
public void process(Operator operator, List<COSBase> operands) throws IOException {
if (operands.size() < 4) {
throw new MissingOperandException(operator, operands);
}
if (!checkArrayTypesClass(operands, COSNumber.class)) {
return;
}
COSNumber x1 = (COSNumber) operands.get(0);
COSNumber y1 = (COSNumber) operands.get(1);
COSNumber x3 = (COSNumber) operands.get(2);
COSNumber y3 = (COSNumber) operands.get(3);
Point2D.Float point1 = context.transformedPoint(x1.floatValue(), y1.floatValue());
Point2D.Float point3 = context.transformedPoint(x3.floatValue(), y3.floatValue());
li
