ContentScaler

User Guide — Mapsoft ContentScaler Plugin for Adobe Acrobat

Overview

ContentScaler is an Adobe Acrobat plug-in that scales the visual content of PDF pages by a specified percentage. Unlike changing the page’s media box dimensions, ContentScaler transforms the actual content stream — all text, images, vector graphics, and other page elements are uniformly scaled while the page dimensions remain unchanged. This is useful when you need to shrink content to add margins for binding, enlarge content for readability, or fit content originally designed for one paper size onto another.

The plug-in operates by prepending a graphics-state transformation matrix to each selected page’s content stream. Translation offsets are automatically calculated to compensate for non-zero page origins, ensuring that content remains correctly positioned after scaling.

ContentScaler is available in three variants: an Acrobat plug-in (MAPSContentScaler.api), a COM automation DLL for scripted workflows, and a workflow server library (.lpi) for use with the Mapsoft Workflow Server.

Getting Started

After installation, ContentScaler adds a menu item to Adobe Acrobat. To open the ContentScaler dialog:

Open a PDF document in Adobe Acrobat.
Go to Plug-Ins › Mapsoft › ContentScaler.
The ContentScaler dialog will appear with scaling options, page selection controls, and configuration management.

Enter a scaling percentage, select which pages to process, and click OK to apply the scaling. The changes are made directly to the document’s content streams. Remember to save the PDF afterwards to preserve the changes.

Tip: A scaling value of 100.00 leaves the content unchanged. Values below 100 shrink the content (e.g. 90.00 reduces to 90% of original size), and values above 100 enlarge it.

Scaling Options

Percentage Scaling

The primary control is the Scale By percentage field. Enter any positive decimal value to uniformly scale all page content. For example, entering 75.00 shrinks all content to 75% of its original size, while 120.00 enlarges it to 120%. The scaling is applied uniformly in both horizontal and vertical directions, preserving the aspect ratio of all page elements.

The scaling value must be a positive number. Values of zero or negative numbers are rejected with a validation error. Decimal values are supported for fine-grained control — for example, 99.50 applies a very slight reduction.

Media Size Presets

The Media Size drop-down provides a selection of standard paper sizes. When you select a preset, ContentScaler automatically calculates the appropriate scaling percentage needed to fit the current page content onto the target paper size. This is a convenient shortcut when you know the target output size but do not want to calculate the percentage manually.

You can also define custom media sizes using the Add New Media Size dialog, which lets you specify custom width and height dimensions. Custom media sizes are saved for future use.

Page Selection

ContentScaler provides flexible page selection controls so you can apply scaling to specific pages rather than the entire document:

Option	Description
All Pages	Scales every page in the document. This is the default selection.
Page Range	Scales only the pages you specify. Enter ranges like `1-3,5,7-10` or use open-ended ranges such as `-3` (first three pages) or `20-` (page 20 to the end).
Odd Pages Only	Applies scaling only to odd-numbered pages (1, 3, 5, …). Useful for duplex printing adjustments.
Even Pages Only	Applies scaling only to even-numbered pages (2, 4, 6, …).
Odd and Even	Applies scaling to all pages in the selected range (both odd and even). This is the default.

When you select Page Range, a text field becomes active where you can type comma-separated page numbers and ranges. The plug-in validates the range before applying and will alert you if the format is invalid.

Saved Configurations

ContentScaler supports named configuration presets so you can save and recall your most frequently used scaling settings. Each preset stores the scaling percentage, page range, and odd/even page selection.

Saving a Preset

Type a name in the Configuration drop-down and click Save. All current settings are written to the ContentScaler.ini file. If a preset with the same name already exists, you will be prompted to confirm the overwrite.

Loading a Preset

Select a previously saved preset from the configuration drop-down. All settings — scaling percentage, page range, and odd/even selection — are restored to the dialog controls.

Removing a Preset

Select a preset from the drop-down and click Remove to permanently delete it. The preset name and all its stored values are removed from the INI file.

COM Automation

ContentScaler exposes a COM automation interface (IContentScaleAuto) that allows external applications and scripts to drive the scaling operation programmatically. This is available in the Automation build variant, installed as MAPSContentScaler.dll.

The COM interface provides the following properties and methods:

Member	Type	Description
`fScaleByPercentage`	Property	Get/set the scaling percentage (e.g. `75.0`).
`bAllPages`	Property	Get/set whether all pages should be scaled (`True`/`False`).
`nOddAndOrEvenPages`	Property	Get/set odd/even page filtering (0 = both, 1 = odd only, 2 = even only).
`strPageRange`	Property	Get/set the page range string (e.g. `"1-5,10"`).
`ScaleContent(PDFHandle)`	Method	Execute scaling on the specified PDF document handle. Returns a status code.

Tip: The COM interface can be called from VBScript, PowerShell, C#, or any COM-aware language. This makes it straightforward to integrate ContentScaler into automated document processing pipelines.

System Requirements

Adobe Acrobat: Acrobat Pro or Standard DC (2017 or later). Not compatible with Acrobat Reader.
Operating System: Windows 10 or Windows 11 (32-bit and 64-bit Acrobat installations both supported).
COM Automation: The automation variant requires registration via regsvr32 and is typically installed by the Mapsoft Workflow Server installer.

Support

If you encounter a problem or have a question not covered here, please get in touch: