I'am tasked with converting tons of .doc files to .pdf. And the only way my supervisor wants me to do this is through MSWord 2010. I know I should be able to automate this with python COM automation. Only problem is I dont know how and where to start. I tried searching for some tutorials but was not able to find any (May be I might have, but I don't know what I'm looking for).
Right now I'm reading through this. Dont know how useful this is going to be.
A simple example using comtypes, converting a single file, input and output filenames given as commandline arguments:
import sys
import os
import comtypes.client
wdFormatPDF = 17
in_file = os.path.abspath(sys.argv[1])
out_file = os.path.abspath(sys.argv[2])
word = comtypes.client.CreateObject('Word.Application')
doc = word.Documents.Open(in_file)
doc.SaveAs(out_file, FileFormat=wdFormatPDF)
doc.Close()
word.Quit()
You could also use pywin32, which would be the same except for:
import win32com.client
and then:
word = win32com.client.Dispatch('Word.Application')
You can use the docx2pdf python package to bulk convert docx to pdf. It can be used as both a CLI and a python library. It requires Microsoft Office to be installed and uses COM on Windows and AppleScript (JXA) on macOS.
from docx2pdf import convert
convert("input.docx")
convert("input.docx", "output.pdf")
convert("my_docx_folder/")
pip install docx2pdf
docx2pdf input.docx output.pdf
Disclaimer: I wrote the docx2pdf package. https://github.com/AlJohri/docx2pdf
I have tested many solutions but no one of them works efficiently on Linux distribution.
I recommend this solution :
import sys
import subprocess
import re
def convert_to(folder, source, timeout=None):
args = [libreoffice_exec(), '--headless', '--convert-to', 'pdf', '--outdir', folder, source]
process = subprocess.run(args, stdout=subprocess.PIPE, stderr=subprocess.PIPE, timeout=timeout)
filename = re.search('-> (.*?) using filter', process.stdout.decode())
return filename.group(1)
def libreoffice_exec():
# TODO: Provide support for more platforms
if sys.platform == 'darwin':
return '/Applications/LibreOffice.app/Contents/MacOS/soffice'
return 'libreoffice'
and you call your function:
result = convert_to('TEMP Directory', 'Your File', timeout=15)
All resources:
https://michalzalecki.com/converting-docx-to-pdf-using-python/
I have worked on this problem for half a day, so I think I should share some of my experience on this matter. Steven's answer is right, but it will fail on my computer. There are two key points to fix it here:
(1). The first time when I created the 'Word.Application' object, I should make it (the word app) visible before open any documents. (Actually, even I myself cannot explain why this works. If I do not do this on my computer, the program will crash when I try to open a document in the invisible model, then the 'Word.Application' object will be deleted by OS. )
(2). After doing (1), the program will work well sometimes but may fail often. The crash error "COMError: (-2147418111, 'Call was rejected by callee.', (None, None, None, 0, None))" means that the COM Server may not be able to response so quickly. So I add a delay before I tried to open a document.
After doing these two steps, the program will work perfectly with no failure anymore. The demo code is as below. If you have encountered the same problems, try to follow these two steps. Hope it helps.
import os
import comtypes.client
import time
wdFormatPDF = 17
# absolute path is needed
# be careful about the slash '\', use '\\' or '/' or raw string r"..."
in_file=r'absolute path of input docx file 1'
out_file=r'absolute path of output pdf file 1'
in_file2=r'absolute path of input docx file 2'
out_file2=r'absolute path of outputpdf file 2'
# print out filenames
print in_file
print out_file
print in_file2
print out_file2
# create COM object
word = comtypes.client.CreateObject('Word.Application')
# key point 1: make word visible before open a new document
word.Visible = True
# key point 2: wait for the COM Server to prepare well.
time.sleep(3)
# convert docx file 1 to pdf file 1
doc=word.Documents.Open(in_file) # open docx file 1
doc.SaveAs(out_file, FileFormat=wdFormatPDF) # conversion
doc.Close() # close docx file 1
word.Visible = False
# convert docx file 2 to pdf file 2
doc = word.Documents.Open(in_file2) # open docx file 2
doc.SaveAs(out_file2, FileFormat=wdFormatPDF) # conversion
doc.Close() # close docx file 2
word.Quit() # close Word Application
unoconv (writen in Python) and OpenOffice running as a headless daemon.
https://github.com/unoconv/unoconv
http://dag.wiee.rs/home-made/unoconv/
Works very nicely for doc, docx, ppt, pptx, xls, xlsx.
Very useful if you need to convert docs or save/convert to certain formats on a server.
As an alternative to the SaveAs function, you could also use ExportAsFixedFormat which gives you access to the PDF options dialog you would normally see in Word. With this you can specify bookmarks and other document properties.
doc.ExportAsFixedFormat(OutputFileName=pdf_file,
ExportFormat=17, #17 = PDF output, 18=XPS output
OpenAfterExport=False,
OptimizeFor=0, #0=Print (higher res), 1=Screen (lower res)
CreateBookmarks=1, #0=No bookmarks, 1=Heading bookmarks only, 2=bookmarks match word bookmarks
DocStructureTags=True
);
The full list of function arguments is: 'OutputFileName', 'ExportFormat', 'OpenAfterExport', 'OptimizeFor', 'Range', 'From', 'To', 'Item', 'IncludeDocProps', 'KeepIRM', 'CreateBookmarks', 'DocStructureTags', 'BitmapMissingFonts', 'UseISO19005_1', 'FixedFormatExtClassPtr'
It's worth noting that Stevens answer works, but make sure if using a for loop to export multiple files to place the ClientObject or Dispatch statements before the loop - it only needs to be created once - see my problem: Python win32com.client.Dispatch looping through Word documents and export to PDF; fails when next loop occurs
If you don't mind using PowerShell have a look at this Hey, Scripting Guy! article. The code presented could be adopted to use the wdFormatPDF enumeration value of WdSaveFormat (see here).
This blog article presents a different implementation of the same idea.
I have modified it for ppt support as well. My solution support all the below-specified extensions.
word_extensions = [".doc", ".odt", ".rtf", ".docx", ".dotm", ".docm"]
ppt_extensions = [".ppt", ".pptx"]
My Solution: Github Link
I have modified code from Docx2PDF
I tried the accepted answer but wasn't particularly keen on the bloated PDFs Word was producing which was usually an order of magnitude bigger than expected. After looking how to disable the dialogs when using a virtual PDF printer I came across Bullzip PDF Printer and I've been rather impressed with its features. It's now replaced the other virtual printers I used previously. You'll find a "free community edition" on their download page.
The COM API can be found here and a list of the usable settings can be found here. The settings are written to a "runonce" file which is used for one print job only and then removed automatically. When printing multiple PDFs we need to make sure one print job completes before starting another to ensure the settings are used correctly for each file.
import os, re, time, datetime, win32com.client
def print_to_Bullzip(file):
util = win32com.client.Dispatch("Bullzip.PDFUtil")
settings = win32com.client.Dispatch("Bullzip.PDFSettings")
settings.PrinterName = util.DefaultPrinterName # make sure we're controlling the right PDF printer
outputFile = re.sub("\.[^.]+$", ".pdf", file)
statusFile = re.sub("\.[^.]+$", ".status", file)
settings.SetValue("Output", outputFile)
settings.SetValue("ConfirmOverwrite", "no")
settings.SetValue("ShowSaveAS", "never")
settings.SetValue("ShowSettings", "never")
settings.SetValue("ShowPDF", "no")
settings.SetValue("ShowProgress", "no")
settings.SetValue("ShowProgressFinished", "no") # disable balloon tip
settings.SetValue("StatusFile", statusFile) # created after print job
settings.WriteSettings(True) # write settings to the runonce.ini
util.PrintFile(file, util.DefaultPrinterName) # send to Bullzip virtual printer
# wait until print job completes before continuing
# otherwise settings for the next job may not be used
timestamp = datetime.datetime.now()
while( (datetime.datetime.now() - timestamp).seconds < 10):
if os.path.exists(statusFile) and os.path.isfile(statusFile):
error = util.ReadIniString(statusFile, "Status", "Errors", '')
if error != "0":
raise IOError("PDF was created with errors")
os.remove(statusFile)
return
time.sleep(0.1)
raise IOError("PDF creation timed out")
I was working with this solution but I needed to search all .docx, .dotm, .docm, .odt, .doc or .rtf and then turn them all to .pdf (python 3.7.5). Hope it works...
import os
import win32com.client
wdFormatPDF = 17
for root, dirs, files in os.walk(r'your directory here'):
for f in files:
if f.endswith(".doc") or f.endswith(".odt") or f.endswith(".rtf"):
try:
print(f)
in_file=os.path.join(root,f)
word = win32com.client.Dispatch('Word.Application')
word.Visible = False
doc = word.Documents.Open(in_file)
doc.SaveAs(os.path.join(root,f[:-4]), FileFormat=wdFormatPDF)
doc.Close()
word.Quit()
word.Visible = True
print ('done')
os.remove(os.path.join(root,f))
pass
except:
print('could not open')
# os.remove(os.path.join(root,f))
elif f.endswith(".docx") or f.endswith(".dotm") or f.endswith(".docm"):
try:
print(f)
in_file=os.path.join(root,f)
word = win32com.client.Dispatch('Word.Application')
word.Visible = False
doc = word.Documents.Open(in_file)
doc.SaveAs(os.path.join(root,f[:-5]), FileFormat=wdFormatPDF)
doc.Close()
word.Quit()
word.Visible = True
print ('done')
os.remove(os.path.join(root,f))
pass
except:
print('could not open')
# os.remove(os.path.join(root,f))
else:
pass
The try and except was for those documents I couldn't read and won't exit the code until the last document.
You should start from investigating so called virtual PDF print drivers.
As soon as you will find one you should be able to write batch file that prints your DOC files into PDF files. You probably can do this in Python too (setup printer driver output and issue document/print command in MSWord, later can be done using command line AFAIR).
import docx2txt
from win32com import client
import os
files_from_folder = r"c:\\doc"
directory = os.fsencode(files_from_folder)
amount = 1
word = client.DispatchEx("Word.Application")
word.Visible = True
for file in os.listdir(directory):
filename = os.fsdecode(file)
print(filename)
if filename.endswith('docx'):
text = docx2txt.process(os.path.join(files_from_folder, filename))
print(f'{filename} transfered ({amount})')
amount += 1
new_filename = filename.split('.')[0] + '.txt'
try:
with open(os.path.join(files_from_folder + r'\txt_files', new_filename), 'w', encoding='utf-8') as t:
t.write(text)
except:
os.mkdir(files_from_folder + r'\txt_files')
with open(os.path.join(files_from_folder + r'\txt_files', new_filename), 'w', encoding='utf-8') as t:
t.write(text)
elif filename.endswith('doc'):
doc = word.Documents.Open(os.path.join(files_from_folder, filename))
text = doc.Range().Text
doc.Close()
print(f'{filename} transfered ({amount})')
amount += 1
new_filename = filename.split('.')[0] + '.txt'
try:
with open(os.path.join(files_from_folder + r'\txt_files', new_filename), 'w', encoding='utf-8') as t:
t.write(text)
except:
os.mkdir(files_from_folder + r'\txt_files')
with open(os.path.join(files_from_folder + r'\txt_files', new_filename), 'w', encoding='utf-8') as t:
t.write(text)
word.Quit()
The Source Code, see here:
https://neculaifantanaru.com/en/python-full-code-how-to-convert-doc-and-docx-files-to-pdf-from-the-folder.html
I would suggest ignoring your supervisor and use OpenOffice which has a Python api. OpenOffice has built in support for Python and someone created a library specific for this purpose (PyODConverter).
If he isn't happy with the output, tell him it could take you weeks to do it with word.
I'm trying very hard to find the way to convert a PDF file to a .docx file with Python.
I have seen other posts related with this, but none of them seem to work correctly in my case.
I'm using specifically
import os
import subprocess
for top, dirs, files in os.walk('/my/pdf/folder'):
for filename in files:
if filename.endswith('.pdf'):
abspath = os.path.join(top, filename)
subprocess.call('lowriter --invisible --convert-to doc "{}"'
.format(abspath), shell=True)
This gives me Output[1], but then, I can't find any .docx document in my folder.
I have LibreOffice 5.3 installed.
Any clues about it?
Thank you in advance!
I am not aware of a way to convert a pdf file into a Word file using libreoffice.
However, you can convert from a pdf to a html and then convert the html to a docx.
Firstly, get the commands running on the command line. (The following is on Linux. So you may have to fill in path names to the soffice binary and use a full path for the input file on your OS)
soffice --convert-to html ./my_pdf_file.pdf
then
soffice --convert-to docx:'MS Word 2007 XML' ./my_pdf_file.html
You should end up with:
my_pdf_file.pdf
my_pdf_file.html
my_pdf_file.docx
Now wrap the commands in your subprocess code
I use this for multiple files
####
from pdf2docx import Converter
import os
# # # dir_path for input reading and output files & a for loop # # #
path_input = '/pdftodocx/input/'
path_output = '/pdftodocx/output/'
for file in os.listdir(path_input):
cv = Converter(path_input+file)
cv.convert(path_output+file+'.docx', start=0, end=None)
cv.close()
print(file)
Below code worked for me.
import win32com.client
word = win32com.client.Dispatch("Word.Application")
word.visible = 1
pdfdoc = 'NewDoc.pdf'
todocx = 'NewDoc.docx'
wb1 = word.Documents.Open(pdfdoc)
wb1.SaveAs(todocx, FileFormat=16) # file format for docx
wb1.Close()
word.Quit()
My approach does not follow the same methodology of using subsystems. However this one does the job of reading through all the pages of a PDF document and moving them to a docx file. Note: It only works with text; images and other objects are usually ignored.
#Description: This python script will allow you to fetch text information from a pdf file
#import libraries
import PyPDF2
import os
import docx
mydoc = docx.Document() # document type
pdfFileObj = open('pdf/filename.pdf', 'rb') # pdffile loction
pdfReader = PyPDF2.PdfFileReader(pdfFileObj) # define pdf reader object
# Loop through all the pages
for pageNum in range(1, pdfReader.numPages):
pageObj = pdfReader.getPage(pageNum)
pdfContent = pageObj.extractText() #extracts the content from the page.
print(pdfContent) # print statement to test output in the terminal. codeline optional.
mydoc.add_paragraph(pdfContent) # this adds the content to the word document
mydoc.save("pdf/filename.docx") # Give a name to your output file.
I have successfully done this with pdf2docx :
from pdf2docx import parse
pdf_file = "test.pdf"
word_file = "test.docx"
parse(pdf_file, word_file, start=0, end=None)
I am trying to convert an Excel spreadsheet to PDF using Python and the comtypes package using this code:
import os
import comtypes.client
FORMAT_PDF = 17
SOURCE_DIR = 'C:/Users/IEUser/Documents/jscript/test/resources/root3'
TARGET_DIR = 'C:/Users/IEUser/Documents/jscript'
app = comtypes.client.CreateObject('Excel.Application')
app.Visible = False
infile = os.path.join(os.path.abspath(SOURCE_DIR), 'spreadsheet1.xlsx')
outfile = os.path.join(os.path.abspath(TARGET_DIR), 'spreadsheet1.pdf')
doc = app.Workbooks.Open(infile)
doc.SaveAs(outfile, FileFormat=FORMAT_PDF)
doc.Close()
app.Quit()
This script above runs fine and the pdf file is created, but when I try to open it I get the error "The file cannot be opened - there is a problem with the file format" (but after closing this error dialog it is actually possible to preview the pdf file). I have tried a similar script to convert Word documents to pdfs and this worked just fine.
Any ideas on how I can resolve this problem with the file format error?
Found a solution - this seems to be working:
import os
import comtypes.client
SOURCE_DIR = 'C:/Users/IEUser/Documents/jscript/test/resources/root3'
TARGET_DIR = 'C:/Users/IEUser/Documents/jscript'
app = comtypes.client.CreateObject('Excel.Application')
app.Visible = False
infile = os.path.join(os.path.abspath(SOURCE_DIR), 'spreadsheet1.xlsx')
outfile = os.path.join(os.path.abspath(TARGET_DIR), 'spreadsheet1.pdf')
doc = app.Workbooks.Open(infile)
doc.ExportAsFixedFormat(0, outfile, 1, 0)
doc.Close()
app.Quit()
This link may also be helpful as an inspiration regarding the arguments to the ExportAsFixedFormatfunction: Document.ExportAsFixedFormat Method (although some of the values of arguments have to be modified a bit).
You need to describe ExportAsFixedFormat(0,outputfile) to save workbook in pdf format. The solution from http://thequickblog.com/convert-an-excel-filexlsx-to-pdf-python/ works for me.
from win32com import client
import win32api
input_file = r'C:\Users\thequickblog\Desktop\Python session 2\tqb_sample.xlsx'
#give your file name with valid path
output_file = r'C:\Users\thequickblog\Desktop\Python session 2\tqb_sample_output.pdf'
#give valid output file name and path
app = client.DispatchEx("Excel.Application")
app.Interactive = False
app.Visible = False
Workbook = app.Workbooks.Open(input_file)
try:
Workbook.ActiveSheet.ExportAsFixedFormat(0, output_file)
except Exception as e:
print("Failed to convert in PDF format.Please confirm environment meets all the requirements and try again")
print(str(e))
finally:
Workbook.Close()
app.Exit()
I am new to Python. I am attempting to create a Python OCR program, and am following a tutorial online for it. Here is the recommended code I use:
from PIL import Image
from pytesser import *
image_file = 'menu.tif'
im = Image.open(image_file)
text = image_to_string(im)
text = image_file_to_string(image_file)
text = image_file_to_string(image_file, graceful_errors=True)
print "=====output=======\n"
print text
The tutorial link is found here. I am getting this error when running this code however.
from pytesser import *
ImportError: No module named 'pytesser'
I have followed the instructions, from installing OCR here and the PyTesser library here code(dot)google(dot)com/archive/p/pytesser/downloads (sorry because <10 rep i can't post more than 2 links).
This (see gyazo below) is a screenshot of my installation files so far, where "pytesser_v0.0.1" is my pytesser folder, "tesseract-master" was found on GitHub (probably not relevant), and "tessinstall" is the folder where I installed tesseract and finally pyimgr.py is my file I am attempting to run.
gyazo(dot)com/333f8a3333e87895558f26875a8a8487
I was also previously getting an error regarding PIL import Image. I should not be using PIL, so is there any other way I can import Image without PIL? maybe pillow?
My Python version is 3.5.2 and I am using windows 10.
My first hunch is that your library is installed in a place that Python does not know.
import sys
print sys.path
If you execute those lines in Python it will show you where Python will look for eggs. Is the pytesser lib there?
Furthermore: As a side note:
pip3 search tesseract will show you some other tesseract Python packages. So you can use the Python package manager.
Change the code to this:
"""OCR in Python using the Tesseract engine from Google
http://code.google.com/p/pytesser/
by Michael J.T. O'Kelly
V 0.0.1, 3/10/07"""
import PIL.Image
import subprocess
import util
import errors
tesseract_exe_name = 'tesseract' # Name of executable to be called at command line
scratch_image_name = "temp.bmp" # This file must be .bmp or other Tesseract-compatible format
scratch_text_name_root = "temp" # Leave out the .txt extension
cleanup_scratch_flag = True # Temporary files cleaned up after OCR operation
def call_tesseract(input_filename, output_filename):
"""Calls external tesseract.exe on input file (restrictions on types),
outputting output_filename+'txt'"""
args = [tesseract_exe_name, input_filename, output_filename]
proc = subprocess.Popen(args)
retcode = proc.wait()
if retcode!=0:
errors.check_for_errors()
def image_to_string(im, cleanup = cleanup_scratch_flag):
"""Converts im to file, applies tesseract, and fetches resulting text.
If cleanup=True, delete scratch files after operation."""
try:
util.image_to_scratch(im, scratch_image_name)
call_tesseract(scratch_image_name, scratch_text_name_root)
text = util.retrieve_text(scratch_text_name_root)
finally:
if cleanup:
util.perform_cleanup(scratch_image_name, scratch_text_name_root)
return text
def image_file_to_string(filename, cleanup = cleanup_scratch_flag, graceful_errors=True):
"""Applies tesseract to filename; or, if image is incompatible and graceful_errors=True,
converts to compatible format and then applies tesseract. Fetches resulting text.
If cleanup=True, delete scratch files after operation."""
try:
try:
call_tesseract(filename, scratch_text_name_root)
text = util.retrieve_text(scratch_text_name_root)
except errors.Tesser_General_Exception:
if graceful_errors:
im = PIL.Image.open(filename)
text = image_to_string(im, cleanup)
else:
raise
finally:
if cleanup:
util.perform_cleanup(scratch_image_name, scratch_text_name_root)
return text
if __name__=='__main__':
im = PIL.Image.open('phototest.tif')
text = image_to_string(im)
print text
try:
text = image_file_to_string('fnord.tif', graceful_errors=False)
except errors.Tesser_General_Exception, value:
print "fnord.tif is incompatible filetype. Try graceful_errors=True"
print value
text = image_file_to_string('fnord.tif', graceful_errors=True)
print "fnord.tif contents:", text
text = image_file_to_string('fonts_test.png', graceful_errors=True)
print text