ocr-and-documents
Extract text from PDFs and scanned documents. Use web_extract for remote URLs, pymupdf for local text-based PDFs, marker-pdf for OCR/scanned docs. For DOCX use python-docx, for PPTX see the powerpoint
Extract text from PDFs and scanned documents. Use web_extract for remote URLs, pymupdf for local text-based PDFs, marker-pdf for OCR/scanned docs. For DOCX use python-docx, for PPTX see the powerpoint
Real data. Real impact.
Emerging
Developers
Per week
Excellent
Skills give you superpowers. Install in 30 seconds.
For DOCX: use
python-docx (parses actual document structure, far better than OCR).
For PPTX: see the powerpoint skill (uses python-pptx with full slide/notes support).
This skill covers PDFs and scanned documents.
If the document has a URL, always try
first:web_extract
web_extract(urls=["https://arxiv.org/pdf/2402.03300"]) web_extract(urls=["https://example.com/report.pdf"])
This handles PDF-to-markdown conversion via Firecrawl with no local dependencies.
Only use local extraction when: the file is local, web_extract fails, or you need batch processing.
| Feature | pymupdf (~25MB) | marker-pdf (~3-5GB) |
|---|---|---|
| Text-based PDF | ✅ | ✅ |
| Scanned PDF (OCR) | ❌ | ✅ (90+ languages) |
| Tables | ✅ (basic) | ✅ (high accuracy) |
| Equations / LaTeX | ❌ | ✅ |
| Code blocks | ❌ | ✅ |
| Forms | ❌ | ✅ |
| Headers/footers removal | ❌ | ✅ |
| Reading order detection | ❌ | ✅ |
| Images extraction | ✅ (embedded) | ✅ (with context) |
| Images → text (OCR) | ❌ | ✅ |
| EPUB | ✅ | ✅ |
| Markdown output | ✅ (via pymupdf4llm) | ✅ (native, higher quality) |
| Install size | ~25MB | ~3-5GB (PyTorch + models) |
| Speed | Instant | ~1-14s/page (CPU), ~0.2s/page (GPU) |
Decision: Use pymupdf unless you need OCR, equations, forms, or complex layout analysis.
If the user needs marker capabilities but the system lacks ~5GB free disk:
"This document needs OCR/advanced extraction (marker-pdf), which requires ~5GB for PyTorch and models. Your system has [X]GB free. Options: free up space, provide a URL so I can use web_extract, or I can try pymupdf which works for text-based PDFs but not scanned documents or equations."
pip install pymupdf pymupdf4llm
Via helper script:
python scripts/extract_pymupdf.py document.pdf # Plain text python scripts/extract_pymupdf.py document.pdf --markdown # Markdown python scripts/extract_pymupdf.py document.pdf --tables # Tables python scripts/extract_pymupdf.py document.pdf --images out/ # Extract images python scripts/extract_pymupdf.py document.pdf --metadata # Title, author, pages python scripts/extract_pymupdf.py document.pdf --pages 0-4 # Specific pages
Inline:
python3 -c " import pymupdf doc = pymupdf.open('document.pdf') for page in doc: print(page.get_text()) "
# Check disk space first python scripts/extract_marker.py --check pip install marker-pdf
Via helper script:
python scripts/extract_marker.py document.pdf # Markdown python scripts/extract_marker.py document.pdf --json # JSON with metadata python scripts/extract_marker.py document.pdf --output_dir out/ # Save images python scripts/extract_marker.py scanned.pdf # Scanned PDF (OCR) python scripts/extract_marker.py document.pdf --use_llm # LLM-boosted accuracy
CLI (installed with marker-pdf):
marker_single document.pdf --output_dir ./output marker /path/to/folder --workers 4 # Batch
# Abstract only (fast) web_extract(urls=["https://arxiv.org/abs/2402.03300"]) # Full paper web_extract(urls=["https://arxiv.org/pdf/2402.03300"]) # Search web_search(query="arxiv GRPO reinforcement learning 2026")
pymupdf handles these natively — use
execute_code or inline Python:
# Split: extract pages 1-5 to a new PDF import pymupdf doc = pymupdf.open("report.pdf") new = pymupdf.open() for i in range(5): new.insert_pdf(doc, from_page=i, to_page=i) new.save("pages_1-5.pdf")
# Merge multiple PDFs import pymupdf result = pymupdf.open() for path in ["a.pdf", "b.pdf", "c.pdf"]: result.insert_pdf(pymupdf.open(path)) result.save("merged.pdf")
# Search for text across all pages import pymupdf doc = pymupdf.open("report.pdf") for i, page in enumerate(doc): results = page.search_for("revenue") if results: print(f"Page {i+1}: {len(results)} match(es)") print(page.get_text("text"))
No extra dependencies needed — pymupdf covers split, merge, search, and text extraction in one package.
web_extract is always first choice for URLs--help for full usage~/.cache/huggingface/ on first usepip install python-docx (better than OCR — parses actual structure)powerpoint skill (uses python-pptx)MIT
mkdir -p ~/.hermes/skills/productivity/ocr-and-documents && curl -o ~/.hermes/skills/productivity/ocr-and-documents/SKILL.md https://raw.githubusercontent.com/NousResearch/hermes-agent/main/skills/productivity/ocr-and-documents/SKILL.md1,500+ AI skills, agents & workflows. Install in 30 seconds. Part of the Torly.ai family.
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