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Tcl -> Com -> Excel -> pdf

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Bob Halpin

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May 9, 2006, 11:07:46 PM5/9/06
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Hi,

I'm using Tcl/Tk & com to drive Excel/Word.

I have need to produce pdf file from the Excel/Word files, and am
looking for a way to print through a PDF driver to a disk file.

The Excel/Word mechanics are all in place, but I need a PDF driver that
operates 'transparently', ie: no user interraction required. (In fact,
the user won't even see Word/Excel at all - I'll boot it 'under the
hood', fill in the data, set the printer to the pdf printer, and cause
it to print.)

I looked at PrimoPDF (http://www.primopdf.com/) and it's great - except
when you print to it it displays some user-dialogs that I want to
circumvent. They answered the 1st inquiry I made to them about this with
a request for a bit more detail on what I need, but haven't had any
response since I answered them several days ago.

Can anyone suggest another (hopefully free) pdf driver with the 'silent'
aspect I need?

Thank's in advance.

Bob

stephan...@yahoo.fr

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May 10, 2006, 2:09:44 AM5/10/06
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If your output is simple, you might take a look at Trampoline! or
Pdf4Tcl, which create pdf files without any external program.

http://trampoline.sourceforge.net/

Pdf4Tcl : http://wiki.tcl.tk/13449

Hoping it helps,

Stéphane

EKB

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May 10, 2006, 7:12:55 AM5/10/06
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Trampoline and PDF4Tcl look nifty! But I think they're different than
what the original poster was asking for. They print to PDF directly
from Tcl/Tk, but the OP was looking for something that could
automatically print from Excel/Word to PDF without popping up a dialog.

Free tools such as PDFWriter or CutePDF use GPL Ghostscript. They use a
built-in postscript printer driver, then use the command-line GPL
Ghostscript tools. I haven't done any command-line Ghostscript stuff in
ages, but apparently you can get the code from here:

http://www.gnu.org/software/ghostscript/ghostscript.html

Michael Schlenker

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May 10, 2006, 7:32:30 AM5/10/06
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The non free acrobat can be controlled via COM, but there may be others.

Michael

Jeff Godfrey

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May 10, 2006, 9:48:29 AM5/10/06
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"Bob Halpin" <bha...@attglobal.net> wrote in message
news:e3rl2g$8nb$1...@tan.netsurf.net...

> Can anyone suggest another (hopefully free) pdf driver with the
> 'silent' aspect I need?

Bob,

While I don't know if any of these are suitable for your needs, here
are the names of a number of free PDF print drivers:

PrimoPDF
CutePDF Writer
PDF995
PDF4Free

Just Google for their respective sites.

Jeff


Bob Halpin

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May 10, 2006, 10:00:38 AM5/10/06
to Bob Halpin
Thank's to all - I'll explore the options you all suggested.

Bob

Cameron Laird

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May 10, 2006, 9:38:13 AM5/10/06
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In article <4ce1aeF...@news.dfncis.de>,

OpenOffice is scriptable, and widely heralded for its ability to write PDF.

ethouris

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May 10, 2006, 1:52:15 PM5/10/06
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Cameron Laird wrote:
> >The non free acrobat can be controlled via COM, but there may be others.
> >
> >Michael
>
> OpenOffice is scriptable, and widely heralded for its ability to write PDF.

Is it also COM-controllable?

I think the Windows version should be, but I found no description of
the COM interface for OOo.

stephan...@yahoo.fr

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May 10, 2006, 2:50:23 PM5/10/06
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OOo is maybe not scriptable via COM, but it is with [tcluno], which
requires to tell OOo (with a command-line option) to act as a server.

http://tcluno.sourceforge.net/

Stéphane

gersoo

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May 12, 2006, 5:45:21 PM5/12/06
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Hello,

For COM and Openoffice see also:

http://wiki.tcl.tk/14528


GS

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