Maskorium

Maskorium is a small CLI tool that prepares training PDFs for distribution by:

• applying a watermark mask to every page,
• prepending a standardized cover page,
• producing a final exportable PDF.

It is designed for repeatable document packaging workflows where consistency matters.

Why Maskorium

When teams publish many course materials, manual PDF edits are error-prone and slow. Maskorium automates this final packaging step so each document follows the same diffusion policy and visual format.

Typical use cases:

• training/course handouts,
• internal distribution copies,
• branded cover pages,
• confidentiality and copyright reminders.

Features

• Add a mask PDF on all pages (--mask).
• Add a cover PDF as first page (--cover).
• Use direct file paths or template names from data directories.
• List available templates with --mask help and --cover help.
• Keep workflow simple: POSIX shell script + pdftk.

Requirements

• pdftk which is generally included in most Linux distributions (try apt update && apt install pdftk).

Installation

System-wide install

sudo make install PREFIX=/usr

User-local install

make install PREFIX="$HOME/.local"
export PATH="$HOME/.local/bin:$PATH"

Quick start

List built-in templates:

maskorium --mask help
maskorium --cover help

Generate a packaged PDF:

maskorium \
  --input course.pdf \
  --mask qualiopi.16-9 \
  --cover company.16-9 \
  --output course.release.pdf

Use explicit files instead of template names:

maskorium \
  --input course.pdf \
  --mask ./masks/qualiopi.a4.pdf \
  --cover ./covers/company.a4.pdf \
  --output course.custom.pdf

CLI usage

Usage: maskorium [options]

Options:
  -c, --cover NAME         Use NAME as cover (use 'help' to display available covers)
  -m, --mask NAME          Use NAME as mask (use 'help' to display available masks)
  -i, --input FILE         Use FILE as input file
  -o, --output FILE        Use FILE as output file
  -F, --config-file FILE   Use FILE as config file
  -h, --help               Show this help

Processing order

Maskorium runs transformations in this order:

1. Apply mask on the input PDF.
2. Insert cover as first page.

This means the added cover is not watermarked by the masking step.

Configuration

Maskorium resolves templates from DATA_DIR:

• DATA_DIR/covers
• DATA_DIR/masks

The provided default config is in config/maskorium.conf:

DATA_DIR="/usr/share/maskorium"

The script also supports config file discovery (for example /etc/maskorium.conf and user-level config paths).

Limitations

• No PDF encryption.
• No strong anti-copy protection.
• No metadata/versioning workflow.

The watermark is primarily informative/legal and process-oriented.

Contributing

Contributions are welcome.

1. Open an issue for discussion.
2. Submit a focused pull request with clear rationale.
3. Include reproducible manual test steps.

License

This project is licensed under the GNU General Public License v3.0 (GPL-3.0).