---
title: Quickly apply “Inherit Zoom” to all bookmarks in a PDF file
date: 2010-07-02
topics: PDF,regular expressions
---

I often compile PDF reports totaling 1,000 to 2,000 pages, and am always
creating hierarchical bookmarks for these files. One of my beefs is that often,
clicking a bookmark will change the magnification setting to “fit width” from
whatever you had it set at. Ideally, clicking a bookmark should default to just
leaving the zoom level at whatever the reader is currently set to use (“Inherit
zoom”). I’ve found no way in Acrobat to set the default behaviour for
newly-created bookmarks, and changing these links one at a time in Acrobat is
extremely tedious.

Thankfully, there is [a
solution](http://maba.wordpress.com/2004/06/20/pdf-bookmark-hacks/) provided by
Martin Backschat:

> To modify this annoyance you can directly modify the PDF document in your Text
> editor.
>
> With UltraEdit, for example, I load the PDF document and open the “Search and
> Replace” box, enable “Regular Expressions” and replace all occurrences of
> `R/XYZ*]` with `R/XYZ]`, and then also all occurrences of `R/Fit*]` with
> `R/XYZ]`. Now save the document.
>
> With the Perl scripting language, this hack is applied with
>
> `perl -pe 's#R/(XYZ.*?|Fit.*?)\]#R/XYZ\]#g#' in.pdf >out.pdf`
>
> The next time you open the modified document with Acrobat you will get a
> message that the document is being repaired. Just safe it again with Acrobat
> and everything is fine.

I don’t have UltraEdit but I was able to make this work using
[Notepad++](http://sourceforge.net/projects/notepad-plus/). The exact
search/replace text was slightly different for my PDF files (note the added
space) but the principle is the same:

1. In Notepad++, click the `TextFX` menu, then `TextFX Quick` → `Find/Replace`
   (the standard find/replace tool will not help you here). Make sure you check
   the “Regular Expr” check box on the right.
2. Use `R/XYZ(.*)]` as your search string and `R/XYZ]` as your replace string
   and replace all instances.
3. Do it again using `R/Fit(.*)]` as your search string and the same replace
   string as above.

•comment[#:author "Rob" #:date "May 27, 2011" #:link "https://www.blogger.com/profile/10021798230734615659"]{
Hey I tried this using Notepad++ on a pdf that has a bunch of bookmarks with
different zoom levels. The find/replace didn’t find any matches to the strings.
}

•comment[#:author "Rob" #:date "May 27, 2011" #:link "https://www.blogger.com/profile/10021798230734615659"]{
This was using the TextFX find/replace. Any suggestions to get it to work? It
would be great if I could get it to work
}

•comment[#:author "Shane" #:date "June 24, 2011" #:link "https://www.blogger.com/profile/02454026051373796378"]{
Thanks for the tip. For the folks running into trouble with Notepad++, just
remove the space between the “R” and “/” in “R /XYZ(.\*)\]”, it should be
“R/XYZ(.\*)\]” same thing applies to the repalcement text.
}

•comment[#:author "Joshua" #:date "March 01, 2012" #:link "https://www.blogger.com/profile/08903612467158866477"]{
I couldn’t get it to work using Notepad++, but came up with another solution
using JPDFBookmarks…

[http://codebyjoshua.blogspot.com/2012/02/easily-change-pdf-zoom-level-and-name.html](http://codebyjoshua.blogspot.com/2012/02/easily-change-pdf-zoom-level-and-name.html)
}

•comment[#:author "Daniel Kraus" #:date "January 11, 2014" #:link "https://www.blogger.com/profile/02046983092294373360"]{
I wrote a small java application which is based on the PDF Clown library. It
allows you to easily apply various bookmark configurations, such as ‘Inherit
zoom’, to multiple PDF files within a desired directory.

This is my first public project and due to the fact that I’m taking my exams in
the next couple of weeks, I’m running out of time. But afterwards, which should
be in mid-February, I’ll keep on developing.

In the meantime, feel free to use the application and give some feedback.

[https://bitbucket.org/beatngu13/pdfbookmarkwizard/downloads](https://bitbucket.org/beatngu13/pdfbookmarkwizard/downloads)
}

•comment[#:author "Werner Heckel" #:date "March 21, 2014" #:link "https://www.blogger.com/profile/00817185928224919763"]{
Thanks Daniel. Your tool was a great help.
}

•comment[#:author "N. Jones" #:date "May 27, 2014" #:link "https://www.blogger.com/profile/08891272085176919152"]{
Daniel,

Thanks for the java app. It works like a charm! Great time-saver too.
}

•comment[#:author "SergioUrra" #:date "August 03, 2014" #:link "https://www.blogger.com/profile/13821816373936026294"]{
@Joshua, thanks a lot. I did use JPDFBookmarks. Really nice app.
}

•comment[#:author "Jonnie Tyler" #:date "August 19, 2015" #:link "https://www.blogger.com/profile/03832919638641651711"]{
Thank you Daniel!
}