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I'm producing a document (book class) that will ultimately be produced using offset lithography. It's therefore useful to ensure the total number of pages is a multiple of four by adding as many blank pages to the end as is appropriate.

This answer deals with adding a page if necessary to make the total number even. I can't figure out how to adapt it to deal with multiples of four. Is there a way?

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5  
Are you sure you will need it? Aren't such systems able to add blank pages during the printing process? –  Ulrike Fischer Nov 20 '12 at 12:06
1  
That's a fair comment Ulrike and yes, 'need' would be too strong a word. It just seemed like a handy thing to be able to automate at the production side so I wanted to give it a shot. –  cms_mgr Nov 20 '12 at 12:24
1  
on production side are no single pages printed ... –  Herbert Nov 20 '12 at 12:54
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3 Answers

up vote 10 down vote accepted

\numexpr divisions round, so they are not so good in this case:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{refcount,lastpage}
\usepackage{kantlipsum}

\makeatletter
\newcommand{\checkmultipleoffour}{%
  \count@=\getpagerefnumber{LastPage}%
  \@tempcnta=\count@
  \divide\@tempcnta by 4
  \multiply\@tempcnta by 4
  \count@=\numexpr\count@-\@tempcnta\relax
  \ifnum\count@>0
    \pagestyle{empty}
    \loop\ifnum\count@<4
      \null\clearpage
      \advance\count@\@ne
    \repeat
  \fi
}
\makeatother

\AtEndDocument{\checkmultipleoffour}

\begin{document}

\kant[1-11] % for a 4 page document

% \kant[1-15] % for a 5 page document

\end{document}

The same in expl3 syntax:

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{xparse}
\usepackage{refcount,lastpage}
\usepackage{kantlipsum}

\ExplSyntaxOn
\NewDocumentCommand{\checkmultipleoffour} { }
 {
  \prg_replicate:nn
   { \int_mod:nn { 4 - \int_mod:nn { \getpagerefnumber{LastPage} } { 4 } } { 4 } }
   { \thispagestyle{empty}\null\clearpage }
 }
\ExplSyntaxOff
\AtEndDocument{\checkmultipleoffour}

\begin{document}

\kant[1-11] % for a 4 page document

% \kant[1-15] % for a 5 page document

\end{document}

With \frontmatter and \mainmatter the situation is a bit more complicated.

\documentclass{book}
\usepackage{xparse}
\usepackage{refcount,lastpage,etoolbox}
\usepackage{kantlipsum}

\makeatletter
\patchcmd\mainmatter{\cleardoublepage}
  {%
   \clearpage\edef\@currentlabel{\number\numexpr\arabic{page}\ifodd\arabic{page}+1\fi\relax}%
   \label{LastFrontmatterPage}%
   \cleardoublepage
  }{}{}
\makeatother

\ExplSyntaxOn
\cs_new:Npn \egreg_int_coremainder:nn #1 #2
 {
  \int_mod:nn { #2 - \int_mod:nn { #1 } { #2 } } { #2 }
 }
\NewDocumentCommand{\checkmultipleoffour} { O{0} }
 {
  \prg_replicate:nn
   {
    \egreg_int_coremainder:nn { #1 + \getrefnumber{LastFrontmatterPage} + \getpagerefnumber{LastPage} } { 4 }
   }
   { \thispagestyle{empty}\null\clearpage }
 }
\ExplSyntaxOff
\AtEndDocument{\checkmultipleoffour}

\begin{document}

\frontmatter

\tableofcontents

\mainmatter

\chapter{A}

\kant[1-11]

\end{document}

The \checkmultipleoffour has also an optional argument where specifying possible pages before \frontmatter (an unnumbered frontispiece, for instance).

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Won't this also suffer from the \frontmatter...\backmatter problem? –  Stephan Lehmke Nov 20 '12 at 12:16
 
This doesn't seem to be doing it on my document - I'm getting 58 pages. Is it possible for a package to conflict with something like this? –  cms_mgr Nov 20 '12 at 12:22
 
@StephanLehmke Yes, I've added a version for this. –  egreg Nov 20 '12 at 12:28
 
@cms_mgr My tests give correct results, I don't know what to say. However two (or more) runs are necessary for the process to stabilize. –  egreg Nov 20 '12 at 12:29
 
Comment was before the updated version, going to try it now. –  cms_mgr Nov 20 '12 at 12:37
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I realise that the goal of this is probably to implement a TeX solution, but it really, really is easier after the document has been completed.

file=UITutorial.pdf; pdftk A=$file B=blank.pdf cat A1-end $(repeat $(( (4-(${$(pdfinfo $file| grep '^Pages:'):s/Pages://:s/ /})%4)%4 )) print -n "B1 ") output ${file:r}_4pgs.pdf

or if you prefer it spaced out a bit:

file=UITutorial.pdf; \
pdftk A=$file B=blank.pdf \
cat A1-end \
$(repeat $(( (4-(${$(pdfinfo $file| grep '^Pages:'):s/Pages://:s/ /})%4)%4 )) print -n "B1 ")\
output ${file:r}_4pgs.pdf

Works with zsh on Unix (Linux, MacOSX, ...), don't know if it would work with other shells. Needs blank.pdf to be a PDF consisting of a single blank page.

Explanation:

file=UITutorial.pdf; \

sets the file we'll use so that we only have to refer to it once

pdftk A=$file B=blank.pdf \

Our inputs will be our given file and the blank PDF.

cat A1-end \

The cat command says "Concatenate the following pages into our output" and the first set of pages are all of those from the main file.

$(repeat $(( (4-(${$(pdfinfo $file| grep '^Pages:'):s/Pages://:s/ /})%4)%4 )) print -n "B1 ")\

The second set is a bit more complicated. We find out how many pages our PDF has via the pdfinfo command. Then we take this modulo 4. We want to round up to the nearest multiple of 4 so we want to take 4 - <this number> except that if <this number> is already a multiple of 4 we don't want to add any. So we work out (4 - <pages>%4)%4. Then we insert into the page specification B1 that number of times. This says "Take page 1 from source B" (which was the blank one) and we do it the right number of times.

output ${file:r}_4pgs.pdf

Now we direct our output to <filename>_4pgs.pdf, where <filename> is what we originally specified but with the extension stripped off.

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Hijacking Davids code, try

\makeatletter
\def\emptyclearquadpage
{%
  \clearpage
  \@emptyclearquadpage
}
\def\@emptyclearquadpage
{%
  \ifnum\numexpr((\c@page+1)/4-1)*4+1\relax=\c@page
   \else
    \thispagestyle{empty}%
    \hbox{}\newpage\if@twocolumn\hbox{}\newpage\fi
    \expandafter
    \@emptyclearquadpage
  \fi
}
\makeatother

This will basically produce empty pages to fill up the page counter to a multiple of 4. Adjust as needed.

Sorry for the clumsy numexpr, the totally irrational rounding of integer division is driving me mad...

Edit

Thanks to Ulrike for pointing out that \pagenumbering resets the page counter, so it's not safe to count on it ;-)

Fascinating that \cleardoublepage also only works by coincidence and well-behaving document classes then...

Try

\documentclass{book}

\usepackage{etoolbox}

\makeatletter

\def\emptyclearquadpage
{%
  \clearpage
  \@emptyclearquadpage
}
\def\@emptyclearquadpage
{%
  \@tempcnta=\numexpr\c@page+\totalpages-\@ne\relax
  \ifnum\numexpr((\@tempcnta+2)/4-1)*4\relax=\@tempcnta
   \else
    \thispagestyle{empty}%
    \hbox{}\newpage\if@twocolumn\hbox{}\newpage\fi
    \expandafter
    \@emptyclearquadpage
  \fi
}

\newcount\totalpages

\pretocmd{\pagenumbering}
{\global\advance\totalpages\numexpr\c@page-\@ne\relax}{}{}

\makeatother


\begin{document}

\frontmatter

\clearpage foo
\clearpage foo

\mainmatter

\clearpage foo
\clearpage foo
\clearpage foo


\emptyclearquadpage

\end{document}
share|improve this answer
 
It will only work if you don't change the numbering system in the book. With e.g. \fontmatter abc \mainmatter abc I get 6 pages. –  Ulrike Fischer Nov 20 '12 at 12:05
 
Yes I have to confirm this one isn't doing the trick I'm afraid. –  cms_mgr Nov 20 '12 at 12:06
 
Wow, to consider there is indeed no counter giving the total number of pages in a LaTeX document ;-) ... see my edit. –  Stephan Lehmke Nov 20 '12 at 12:28
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