Splitting a past paper from its mark scheme
A combined download puts the answers one scroll from the questions. Finding the boundary and cutting there takes two minutes and changes what the paper is for.
Guides
Articles on PDFs, past papers and revision
Working with PDFs, properly. 40 guides across eight topics, written by four named people and tested against real documents. No article here exists to occupy a search result.
Working with past exam papers as PDFsPast papers, mark schemes and the folder they live in.5 guides
How to revise effectively from PDFsTurning documents into revision you will actually do.5 guides
Reading PDFs on any deviceWhy PDFs read badly on screens, and how to fix it.5 guides
PDF basics: pages, fonts, text layers and metadataWhat is inside the file, and why it matters.5 guides
Printing PDFs properlyScaling, duplex, booklets and the fit-to-page trap.5 guides
How to scan handwriting for online submissionPhotographing paper so a marker can actually read it.5 guides
Keeping a PDF private: encryption, redaction and metadataEncryption, permissions, redaction and metadata.5 guides
Troubleshooting a PDF that misbehavesDiagnosing the file rather than guessing at it.5 guides
Latest guides
When an online PDF tool is safe, and when it is not
It depends entirely on the document, and the honest answer costs us traffic to give. For some files the answer is no, including on this site.
How to use an examiner report
A mark scheme tells you what the right answer was. An examiner report tells you what thousands of people got wrong and why, which is far more useful and takes ninety seconds to read.
Four reasons a PDF refuses to open
Four causes, in order of likelihood, with a test for each. Most of them are recoverable and one of them is not, and you can tell which in about a minute.
Organising a folder of past papers
Sixty files called 9709_s23_qp_12.pdf is not a resource, it is a search problem. Ten minutes of naming turns it into something you can work from all year.
Highlighting feels like studying. Here is why it is not
It feels exactly like studying, produces a document full of yellow bars, and leaves you no better able to answer a question. Here is the mechanism, and what to do instead.
Why text will not copy
Three causes, and the first one accounts for most of them. All three are diagnosable in under a minute and only two have anything you can do about them.
Building a topic pack
Every question on one topic, from every paper you have, in a single document. It is the most useful thing you can make out of a folder of past papers, and no publisher sells it.
Scanned or digital? A two-second PDF test
It takes two seconds, it determines what you can do with the file, and it explains most of the things people think are broken.
Redacting a PDF properly
A black rectangle drawn over text leaves the text entirely intact underneath. This has ended careers, repeatedly, and it takes ten seconds to check.
Taking notes from a PDF
The rule that makes the difference is not which app you use. It is that your notes have to be readable without the document open beside them.
PDF text stays put on purpose: the reflow problem
It is not an oversight and it is not fixable. A PDF describes a printed page, and reflowing would break the only promise the format makes.