Plugin: Bookmark A Page In Your PDF
With the long, yet wonderful, books in PDF format these days (Agile Web Development with Rails by Dave Thomas and David Heinemeier Hansson with Leon Breedt, Mike Clark, Thomas Fuchs, and Andreas Schwarz [570 pages]; Programming Ruby by Dave Thomas, with Chad Fowler and Andy Hunt [864 pages]) there needs to be a better way to digitally bookmark where you left off. For some reason Adobe Reader (Acrobat Reader) doesn’t have this capability built in. I found a plugin for Acrobat Reader to do multiple bookmarks per document from PDF Hacks. However, I really just want it to be simple like a physical book - you bookmark the page you’re on when you stop and go to that page when you pick back up. So here is my plugin to bookmark your page in Adobe Reader.
Download:
Change Log:
- 1.2 - Nov 30, 2008 - Use documentFileName on PDFs that don’t have a docID. Add French translation (TitCouille). Add installation paths for Linux (TitCouille).
- 1.1 - Dec 20, 2007 - Update to work with Adobe Reader 8 due to security changes (app.trustedFunction)
- 1.0 - Sep 15, 2006 - Initial release
Installation:
Adobe Reader 9 - copy pdf_bookmark.js to:
- Mac: ~/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Acrobat/9.0_x86/JavaScripts (or similar)
- Linux: /home/[User Name]/.adobe/Acrobat/9.0/JavaScripts/
- Windows: C:\Documents and Settings\[User Name]\Application Data\Adobe\Acrobat\9.0\JavaScripts (or similar)
Adobe Reader 8 - copy pdf_bookmark.js to:
- Mac: ~/Library/Acrobat User Data/8.0_x86/JavaScripts (or similar)
- Linux: /home/[User Name]/.adobe/Acrobat/8.0/JavaScripts/
- Windows: C:\Documents and Settings\[User Name]\Application Data\Adobe\Acrobat\8.0\JavaScripts (or similar)
Adobe Reader 7 - copy pdf_bookmark.js to:
- Mac: ~/Library/Acrobat User Data/7.0/JavaScripts (or similar)
- Linux: /home/[User Name]/.adobe/Acrobat/7.0/JavaScripts/
- Windows: C:\Documents and Settings\[User Name]\Application Data\Adobe\Acrobat\7.0\JavaScripts (or similar)
Note: you may have to create the JavaScripts folder if it doesn’t exist.
Usage:
Open your document in Adobe Reader. Then choose Tools -> Bookmark from the menu. “Bookmark This Page” adds the bookmark. “Go To Bookmark” sends you to the bookmark you created. It remembers which PDF document you bookmarked so it works on all of your PDFs simultaneously. (Tested with Acrobat Reader 7, Adobe Reader 8 (thanks Michael) and Adobe Reader 9 on Mac OS X, Linux (thanks TitCouille) and Windows)

suh-weet. thanks, john
What Sean said. And I fixed the link. Thanks!
that was very helpful, thank you very much guys.
Cheers John, was exactly what I was after.
I have to agree it seems a bit mad this feature isn’t built into acrobat reader. Guess some of life simplicities get overlooked in the transition to the digital era!
This is awesome. It is shocking that such basic functionality isn’t part of Adobe Reader. What is worse, Adobe uses the word “bookmark” for something related but different, making web searches for
“real” bookmarks a pain in the neck. (I finally found this page using “acrobat reader bookmark a page”; use the current name of “adobe reader” and you’re out of luck.)
I got this working under Adobe Reader 8 for OS X. The right directory for me was ~/Library/Acrobat User Data/8.0_x86/JavaScripts
Thanks!
Michael, thanks for the heads up and testing this in Adobe Reader 8! I made a couple of changes to the post to reflect your findings.
Thanks John for the plugin. Works great.
I had been pulling out my hair searching Adobe Reader 8 via F1(no help there!)for what I had thought would be a given. Keeping track of where I left off on my collection of various ebooks required an equally varied collection of Post-its. So much for paperless! Thanks so much for this plugin.
OMG! Thankyou for this excellent plugin.
I cannot believe that adobe didn’t have such a fundamental usability option by default.
I’m on Vista Ultimate using adobe reader 8.1.1 and I copied the javascript to C:\Program Files\Adobe\Reader 8.0\Reader\Javascripts and it works just fine, again, thankyou.
Very useful plugin, thanks.
Can this be used with the Windows Mobile Adobe Reader?
Hi Ray, I don’t think it’s possible. The plugin is written with Javascript. I found this in the “Acrobat Reader for Pocket PC User Guide“:
[...] I was looking for a bookmark feature in Acrobat and was dumb folded when I found out that it didn… These icons link to social bookmarking sites where readers can share and discover new web pages. [...]
[...] has a made a great plugin that enables you to bookmark pages in PDF documents. Go get it at his website right [...]
[...] iespēju būs vēl nedaudz jāpagaida, tad grāmatzīmju izmantošana gan tagad būs iespējama, jo John Ford ir radījis lielisku Acrobat Reader spraudni, kas veic elementāru grāmatzīmes [...]
[...] Kur sužinoti daugiau? Įrankio tinklalapyje. [...]
[...] Beschrieben wurde ein solches Verfahren im Buch Bookmark PDF Pages in Reader (PDF) oder bei John Ford, der ein Javascript Plugin beschreibt. Dies wird nach dem Download einfach in das Adobe Reader [...]
Wow! Thank you so much for this. :) I’ve been looking for this feature for a long time, now reading on my PC won’t be such a pain.
[...] Bookmark A PDF Published January 30, 2008 asides , programming , technology Tags: acrobat, adobe, asides, bookmark, pdf, Reader I was looking for a bookmark feature in Acrobat and was dumb folded when I found out that it didn’… [...]
Its indeed a great feature and very helpful.
Adobe has made good software but should include this plugin.
Anyways, thanks a lot.
Excellent plugin!!! I’ve been looking for these feature in adobe reader from quite some time. It’s so simply I don’t understand why Adobe hasn’t implemented it. Thanks a lot!!! You just made my ebook reading a lot easier!!!
Great plugin ! I was looking for something like that for a long time, since Adobe forgot to add this basic functionality (but very useful)
I tested the script on Ubuntu and Fedora 8 and it’s working very well.
I was wondering if there is a way to move the bookmarks to another computer.. Where is the information about the bookmark saved ?
Hi lonut, glad to hear it works on Linux!
On OS X the saved bookmark data is stored in:
~/Library/Acrobat User Data/8.0_x86/JavaScripts/glob.js
On Windows it’s stored in:
C:\Documents and Settings\[User Name]\Application Data\Adobe\Acrobat\8.0\JavaScripts\glob.js
I imagine it’s similar on Linux and if you copy the glob.js to the other machine it should transfer just fine.
Let us know if it works!
Thanks.
[...] http://www.aldenta.com/2006/09/15/plugin-bookmark-a-page-in-your-pdf/ [...]
Thank you very much! My main gripe about acrobat reader has been this simple functionality, the electronic equivalent of the physical bookmark. Now if only I can get it to work on Adobe Reader LE on Tytn II as well…
Works great! Just a tip for user klutzes like me: I couldn’t find the location he was listing for Windows, until I remembered to change the View setting so I could see hidden files. Then there it was.
Works like a charm. Thanks.
I tried the PDF hacks bookmarker and got an internal error in one of my PDFs.
But your bookmarker works great.
I originally wanted to create my own PDF reader/bookmarker based on Adobe AIR but encountered problems along the way.
I think I’m sticking with your approach for now.
Thanks again.
It doesn’t work for me, what am I doing wrong? I copied the file to the location, opened PDF file, did the bookmark, closed file, came back in, tried to go to the bookmark but it wouldn’t go.
I installed this per instructions. I am sure I did everything as stated - no problems finding the appropriate folders, etc., but I could not get it to work. I tried restarting Reader and even rebooting. But it’s not showing up in the menu.
Any idea what’s wrong? I’ve got Reader 8.
It’s a great and simple.
i would like to get keyboard shortcuts.
It will be great!.
anyway thanks a lot.
What operating system are you on and what’s the exact version of Adobe Reader that you’re using if it’s not working for you?
I’m on XP, Adobe 8.1.2.
I installed that other plugin (pdf hacks) and that one worked fine.
i48998, do you know if the information is being stored in the glob.js file (C:\Documents and Settings\[User Name]\Application Data\Adobe\Acrobat\8.0\JavaScripts\glob.js)? It should say something about “global.pdf_bookmark=”. I tested it on Windows XP with Adobe Reader 8.1.2 and its working fine for me. Any error messages or other strange things happening?
Thanks.
I just wanted to say thank you for this great Acrobat Reader plugin you have made. I have to agree that the omission of this very basic usability feature in Reader is typical of a big company trying to get people to upgrade to the writer version of Acrobat. Probably some marketing decision that was agreed upon with open arms. Who knows? Anyways, I personally think a bookmark feature is and will be an imperative staple to electronic books and PDF reading. What you have made perfectly solves the problem Adobe should have solved originally.
Well, keep up the great work John!
I’ve been using this plugin for a while (thanks!), but had some issues after upgrading Ubuntu — the upgraded wiped out Acrobat Reader. I reinstalled it, but forgot to reinstall the plugin. It turns out the Linux 8.1.2 version of Acrobat Reader, at least, does indeed have this feature built in. The setting is buried, however. Go to Document - Accessibility Setup Assistant, click the “Next” button until you get to the last screen of the assistant, and there it is, “Reopen documents to the last viewed page”.
Man, this is sooo sweet. I’ve been looking for it for a loooong time. Thnkx a whole bunch.
Whoooo hoooo…..at last someone actually made something usefull….no really well done….simple perfect works beautiful
Thanks!! Great! Thanks for taking the time to post this for everyone’s benefit.
Hi! The bookmark function appeared in the Reader only after I restarted my computer.
Doesn’t work. The plugin shows up in the tool menu but when I bookmark a page, close the pdf and open it, then “go to bookmark” nothing happens. Is it dependent on how a pdf was created?
Searched bookmark page pdf on google and found this.. just what i was looking for! thanks!
I second what Michael has said on June 27th. Thank you for taking the time to make this available.
Great. It works. But only the latest page added as bookmark is shown. Is it possible to view more than 1 bookmarked pages.
Fantastic! I’ve wished reader has a bookmark for ages. Previously I’ve had to rename the file with the page number in the title, but that was tedious and sometimes I’d forget.
This works perfectly with v9 as well.
Hey. The plug-in doesn’t work for me. I am running on Windows XP Professional and using Adobe Acrobat 7.0.
This error shows up:
Windows Script Host
Script: C:\Program Files\Adobe\Acrobat 7.0\Reader\Javascripts\pdf_bookmark.js
Line: 48
Char: 1
Error: ’self’ is undefined
Code: 800A1391
Source: Microsoft JScript runtime error
Any help is much appreciated.
Thanks
do you have a version for acrobat reader 9? I followed your instructions with acrobat 8, seems not be working.
thanks.
sorry it worked already. its in View menu item. i was looking in Tools item.
Thanks. How can I remove a bookmark?
Hmm I got it working on Linux (Ubuntu) with acrobat 8, but the same page is now permanently bookmarked. That is, I bookmarked a page, came back to it after reopening acrobat, but now whenever I ‘go to bookmark’ I’m taken to that first bookmarked page, regardless of how many times I bookmark a later page.
Weird, and annoying. It seems that if I close and then reopen acrobat after bookmarking a new page, it goes to the correct page. However if I log out or restart the machine, the ‘go to bookmark’ command takes me to that originally bookmarked page. I guess this is something to do with the bookmark being saved in some temporary location that gets deleted…
Any ideas?
Thanks a lot! Works great on linux with acroread 8.1.2
works great also in acrobat 9.0 (windows xp sp2). thanks a lot. makes one wonder why it hasn’t been build-in by adobe.
Works for me with Acrobat 9.0. The path for Vista is quite different tho, its :
C:\Users\{UserName}\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\Acrobat\9.0\JavaScripts
Thanks again!
any way to get this to work in foxit?
Posted this question to yahoo answers.
Will it work with acrobat pro 7?
Thank you! It works! Tried using the PDF Hack version but somehow crashes when switching to different pdf files.
Cheerios,
Yes, it does work in Acrobat Pro 7 … after you enable it!
Edit –> Preferences –> Javascript –> [CHECK] Enable menu items JavaScript execution privileges
Thanks John, I appreciate the shared script. Works perfect!
You Rock.”!!”
Wow dude its wrking for vista.
Thx a lot
it saved me a lot of time recovering which page i have read last night.
I have a problem with this utility in that it does not work for all my EBooks that I get from say OReilly or Epress etc but it does work for all other PDF’s.
I debugged the script and the problem is that the offending PDF’s dont return a this.docID. Has anyone else experienced this issus?
Is there another field I could use as a unique identifier?
I have a temporary hack where I use a fixed identifer if the DocID is null but this will only work for one book which is a shame especially since most of the books I use are EBooks.
[...] There is a plugin, made in JavaScript, with this function to mark a page, to create a bookmark in a PDF doc. The plugin that a discovered is on this page. [...]
Great tooll, thanks
Great!
Thanks a bunch.
Sorry that this has taken a while but if you’ve been having problems please try version 1.2. I believe it will fix the issue of not being able to create a bookmark.
Glad everyone is enjoying the plugin!
For German wording in the menu open the pdf_bookmark.js with wordpad MFC or whatever editor you whish and add
‘DEU’: {
bookmark: ‘Lesezeichen’,
bookmarkThisPage: ‘Lesezeichen setzen’,
gotoBookmark: ‘Zum Lesezeichen springen’
}
to the “var Traslation”
Don´t forget to add a comma ‘,’ behind the swung brace of the ‘FRA’ entry.
Similarly you can add any language you whish, the text in quotes is replacable by any words you whish (I think up to a spcific number of characters…) ;o)
hello there im trying to install this on my mac machine leopard using acrobat 9. when i go to the folder /Library/Application Support/Adobe/Acrobat there is no 9.0_x86 folder just com.adobe.Reader folderand RdrENU90SelfHeal.xml file.
i have tried creating the 9.0_x86 folder but no joy. can someone please help
thanks
phil, thanks for the translation. I’ll add that to the next release.
rasoul, are there any other directories that are similar such as “~/Library/Application Support/Adobe/Acrobat/9.0/JavaScripts” or “~/Library/Acrobat User Data/9.0_x86/JavaScripts”?
hi john
im afraid not. looked everywhere and no folders by those names.
rasoul, make sure at least one PDF has been opened in Adobe Reader and then closed. Next, try searching for the file names ‘glob.js’ and ‘glob.settings.js’ on your computer. That may point you to the JavaScripts folder.
Thanks from Mexico, have been wanting something like this for a while but was to lazy to program it.
thank you!
this information helped me a lot!
n thank you commenters because i got further information from ur comments!
:)
Hi, I really like what you hve done. So many times I have said the same thing bout adobe’s lack of actual reading bookmarks. I prefer sumatra pdf in windows than adobe reader. Is there any chance you could make plugin for sumatra? Thanks. And Right On.
sarah, I don’t know anything about sumatra pdf or if you can develop plugins for it. However, it does appear from a quick search that the program saves the last location of the pdf when you close the program.
Adobe hijacks the word ‘Bookmark’ and yet don’t provide the function the users expect to see from this word.
Thanks for sharing this useful piece of code.
Thanks.
I always wondered why I couldn’t figure out how to use the acrobat bookmark feature. It was because it wasn’t there.
I will now read a few long pdf books!
Omg… i’m o loving this plugin… but pls can u add a shortcut for bookmarking and restoring, i think the would be great. Thanks
splynx, I have looked at the documentation for this but haven’t found a way to add shortcut keys. If anyone knows of a way to do this definitely let me know and I’ll add it.
THANKS!!!
thanks man! very cool plugin. exactly what i was looking for!
Thank you, I am looking for this plugIn, exactly this one, Thanks
Works perfectly, thanks !
Sweeeet. Thanks a ton.
Thank you so much. Just what I needed.
I read a lot of large (20MB+) PDF files and remember where I left off sometimes in 1,000+ pages, this thing is great! Especially for me as a student! Thanks!!
Great plugin. You made my life much easier! Works fine on XP Media Center sp3 with Adobe Reader 9. Thank you for taking the time to write the script and sharing.
this is awesome, thank you (to the power of infinite :))
adobe should pay u a huge royalty :)))))
Hi
For Acrobat Reader 9 and Vista you have to copy the file to :
C:\Program Files\Adobe\Reader 9.0\Reader\Javascripts
Thanks v. much for this, it really helps a lot.
Thanks, this has helped a lot!
Thanks, this is such a simple way to solve a very annoying oversight in acrobat reader.
thanks!
any way to do an upgrade to your hack, to make a “visible” kind of “postit” “real bookmark”?
This worked like a charm. Thanks a lot!
Absolutely unbelievable that this isn’t a built in feature. This link will be shared many times. Thank you!
Thanks for this wonderful and simple plug-in.
It is crazy that Adobe Reader does not have this kind of basic functionality built in!
Wow, thanks dudes! I have to question every day I wake up why haven’t Adobe included something like this thing to this date with their reader! I agree that Adobe should be paying whoever made this thing and take the copyright.
what a great feature!, it’s really strange that Adobe didn’t add this feature to Adobe Reader!
Thanks ! it’s really useful.. I like Adobe Reader but it’s a pity that Adobe Reader doesn’t have this feature .That’s why i have installed foxit reader too .Now I can uninstall Foxit ..
I wanted to comment and thank the author, good stuff
Thanks for this very handy script! I couldn’t believe it wasn’t built in. I’ve got one of those huge Excel 2007 books I want to chip away at for work. A simple bookmark is just what I needed.
Thank you very much! That was quick.
I believe some versions of adobe reader do have bookmarks(please correct me if I’m wrong), but I wonder why they wouldn’t include this simple feature in every version?
Thanks a bunch!
Thank you very much,
For years i have been creating text files that contain my page positions in the pdf books i’m reading - that’s now finaly over.
I would love to know where and how your script saves the page data?
@Tzveeka, Adobe Reader allows the plugin to save data to a global javascript file. So, the code just takes the current page you’re viewing and saves that to the file. If you’re familiar with javascript, open the plugin in a text editor and you can see how it’s done.
Thanks!!!
Fantastic! Exactly what I was looking for.
Sweet, thanks for the awesome plugin and also directions for using it.
Works fine in XP + Adobe Reader 8 (trial version).
Have been searching for such a plugin, din’t even thought this would be this easy. :D
Thanks a ton.
Thanks for this great plugin! It’s going to make reading pdf books a lot easier.
It works! thanks!
Thank You. You made my day….
Brilliant. Many sincere thanks.
Simple and accurate. Good job.
Excellent tool thanks!
thanks for this nice and simple to install plugin. i still can’t believe such an important basic functionality was overlooked. thanks
Great plugin.
I have a small suggestion, I like to start scrolling using the keyboard immediately after moving to the bookmarked page.
I have therefore changed your script a little bit, I use:
this.selectPageNthWord(data[n])
instead of
this.pageNum = data[n];
Simple but essential tool that the people at Adobe neglected to include in 9 versions of reader. Thanks.
This plugin is great, I’ve used it for some time. I have a new laptop with Windows Server 2008, and Adobe Reader 9…anyone know the right folder to put the javascript in?
I’ve tried several, but I can’t seem to get it to work.
Ah, got it figured out. Just like Vista, it’s “C:\Users\\AppData\Roaming\Adobe\Acrobat\9.0\JavaScripts
I guess you have to give it a second to load the javascript…I was opening a PDF, going right to the tools menu, and I couldn’ see it. If you open a PDF, then wait like 2-3 seconds, THEN open the tools menu, it’s there.
Sweet. thanks for writing this plugin, it’s the bees knees I tell ya. I love it.
This is great… simple, but does exactly what I needed. Great job. Thanks a lot John