---
name: "ppmtopict"
section: "1"
platform: "linux"
package: "netpbm"
version: "10.86.51-2"
release: "Arch Linux 2026-11-01"
platforms: ["linux"]
url: "https://new.carta.tech/ppmtopict"
---

# ppmtopict(1)

convert a PPM image to a Macintosh PICT file

## NAME

ppmtopict - convert a PPM image to a Macintosh PICT file

## SYNOPSIS

**ppmtopict**

\[*ppmfile*\]

## DESCRIPTION

This program is part of **Netpbm**(1) .

**ppmtopict** reads a PPM image as input and produces a Macintosh PICT file as output.

The generated file is only the data fork of a picture.  You will need a program such as *mcvert* to generate a Macbinary or a BinHex file that contains the necessary information to identify the file as a PICT file to MacOS.

Even though PICT can have 2 and 4 bits per pixel, **ppmtopict** always generates an 8 bits per pixel file.

## OPTIONS

There are no command line options defined specifically for **ppmtopict**, but it recognizes the options common to all programs based on libnetpbm (See \
  Common Options ⟨index.html#commonoptions⟩ .)

## LIMITATIONS

The picture size field is correct only if the output is to a file since writing into this field requires seeking backwards on a file. However the PICT documentation seems to suggest that this field is not critical anyway since it is only the lower 16 bits of the picture size.

## SEE ALSO

[**picttoppm**(1)](/picttoppm/1.md) ,  **ppm**(1) ,  **mcvert**

## AUTHOR

Copyright (C) 1990 by Ken Yap \<*ken@cs.rocester.edu*\>.

## DOCUMENT SOURCE

This manual page was generated by the Netpbm tool 'makeman' from HTML source.  The master documentation is at

-

  **http://netpbm.sourceforge.net/doc/ppmtopict.html**