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Participating Frequently
December 13, 2017
Answered

Copy all text from multiple text boxes at once

  • December 13, 2017
  • 3 replies
  • 16712 views

I am trying to have a way to select and copy all text at once from a scanned pdf file. I downloaded the Acrobat Pro DC to get the OCR text recognition ability. After I click on "Edit PDF", the text gets recognized, but is separated into many individual text boxes, which prevents me from selecting and copying all text at once. Is there any way to "turn off" or merge all text boxes? In Adobe Acrobat X Standard or previous version of Acrobat Pro, I was able to select all text simultaneously, but not on this current version.

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Correct answer Test Screen Name

You can't expect to select all text from edit mode; that's not what it's for. If you make a trivial change the OCR should not be undone, and you should be able to select all when you exit edit.

3 replies

New Participant
June 24, 2020

In my case, when I save after making a trivial change, the OCR is not saved the PDF saved back to image mode, which means we cant select the text from it. Any advice or direction would be greatly appreciated.

Test Screen NameCorrect answer
Legend
December 19, 2017

You can't expect to select all text from edit mode; that's not what it's for. If you make a trivial change the OCR should not be undone, and you should be able to select all when you exit edit.

jurban00Author
Participating Frequently
December 19, 2017

Yes, that worked! I moved a text box, then exited edit mode and the text was still recognizable. Thanks!

Legend
December 14, 2017

Try leaving edit mode. Then select all (Ctrl+A).

jurban00Author
Participating Frequently
December 19, 2017

Unfortunately, that didn't work. Leaving edit mode removed the OCR text recognition and turned the document back into an image, which meant the text couldn't be selected. It looks like this same question was asked and answered previously in this thread: When I OCR a page, I get separate text boxes and I can't copy all of the text at once? I wasn't completely clear on the answer, but it seems it's not possible.