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Report to PDF without PDF or EPS Printer



 
 
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  #1  
Old June 28th, 2005, 10:41 AM
Dieter Liessmann
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default Report to PDF without PDF or EPS Printer

Hi,
I am searching a solution to create PDFs from Access-Report without a
PDF-Printer.
All solutions I have found (Adobe, Ghostscript, Fineprint....) need a
installed PDF-Printer-Driver.

My Application will be installed on hundreds of different machines, so I
didn't want to get in trouble with all the administrators to install the
right driver.

It is no Problem to pay for a professional solution, but all controls I
found need a installed PDF or EPS Printer.

Perhaps Stephan Lebans way to create native EMF from SNP files is a way
(Report - EMF -PDF)?
But Stephens EMF-solution has some small restrictions :-(.

Any hints ?

Or is there somebody who writes such a tool for cash?

--
So long Dieter

  #2  
Old June 28th, 2005, 11:24 AM
SA
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

Dieter:

There's really no way to produce a PDF file without a printer driver.
Outputting a report to a bit map or meta files is creating and image file.
PDF's are not image files. They are editable documents. The internals of
a correctly structured PDF file are quite extensive. Leave this up to the
PDF printer driver developers.
--
Steve Arbaugh
ACG Soft
http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/attac-cg


"Dieter Liessmann" wrote in message
...
Hi,
I am searching a solution to create PDFs from Access-Report without a
PDF-Printer.
All solutions I have found (Adobe, Ghostscript, Fineprint....) need a
installed PDF-Printer-Driver.

My Application will be installed on hundreds of different machines, so I
didn't want to get in trouble with all the administrators to install the
right driver.

It is no Problem to pay for a professional solution, but all controls I
found need a installed PDF or EPS Printer.

Perhaps Stephan Lebans way to create native EMF from SNP files is a way
(Report - EMF -PDF)?
But Stephens EMF-solution has some small restrictions :-(.

Any hints ?

Or is there somebody who writes such a tool for cash?

--
So long Dieter



  #3  
Old June 28th, 2005, 12:02 PM
Bob Howard
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

Another possibility is CutePDF --- free and simple --- but there really is
no way around a printer driver to handle this....


"Dieter Liessmann" wrote in message
...
Hi,
I am searching a solution to create PDFs from Access-Report without a
PDF-Printer.
All solutions I have found (Adobe, Ghostscript, Fineprint....) need a
installed PDF-Printer-Driver.

My Application will be installed on hundreds of different machines, so I
didn't want to get in trouble with all the administrators to install the
right driver.

It is no Problem to pay for a professional solution, but all controls I
found need a installed PDF or EPS Printer.

Perhaps Stephan Lebans way to create native EMF from SNP files is a way
(Report - EMF -PDF)?
But Stephens EMF-solution has some small restrictions :-(.

Any hints ?

Or is there somebody who writes such a tool for cash?

--
So long Dieter



  #4  
Old June 28th, 2005, 12:05 PM
Dieter Liessmann
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

Hi Steve,

Steve wrote:
There's really no way to produce a PDF file without a printer driver.
Outputting a report to a bit map or meta files is creating and image
file. PDF's are not image files. They are editable documents. The
internals of a correctly structured PDF file are quite extensive. Leave
this up to the PDF printer driver developers.


Of course it is correct, that PDF files normaly are no image files. But I
did not need e editable PDF. You can get a PDF file with only one picture in
it and so you have a PDF wich is not editable.
But it not need to be a PDF. All what i want is a file that includes a
identical copy of a report. This file has to be view with IE or Acrobat
Reader.
So a possible solution for example is to create a jpg or gif from a report.
The Access own snp-format is such a solution, but it can only be shown with
the snapshot-viewer :-(.

--
So long Dieter

  #5  
Old June 28th, 2005, 12:41 PM
Rick Brandt
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

Dieter Liessmann wrote:
Hi Steve,

Steve wrote:
There's really no way to produce a PDF file without a printer
driver. Outputting a report to a bit map or meta files is creating
and image file. PDF's are not image files. They are editable
documents. The internals of a correctly structured PDF file are
quite extensive. Leave this up to the PDF printer driver
developers.


Of course it is correct, that PDF files normaly are no image files.
But I did not need e editable PDF. You can get a PDF file with only
one picture in it and so you have a PDF wich is not editable.
But it not need to be a PDF. All what i want is a file that includes a
identical copy of a report. This file has to be view with IE or
Acrobat Reader.
So a possible solution for example is to create a jpg or gif from a
report. The Access own snp-format is such a solution, but it can only
be shown with the snapshot-viewer :-(.


Stephen Lebans has a utility that embeds the output of Snapshot Format inside an
RTF file so that it can be viewed with any Word processor that handles RTF
files.


--
I don't check the Email account attached
to this message. Send instead to...
RBrandt at Hunter dot com


  #6  
Old June 28th, 2005, 01:00 PM
Dieter Liessmann
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

Rick Brandt wrote:
Stephen Lebans has a utility that embeds the output of Snapshot
Format inside an RTF file so that it can be viewed with any Word
processor that handles RTF files.


Thats right, but the RTF format has some limitations so you can't get
exactly the Report, unless you are using the special Wort-RTF-Format and
then the user needs word.

--
So long Dieter

  #7  
Old June 28th, 2005, 02:08 PM
Rick Brandt
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

Dieter Liessmann wrote:
Rick Brandt wrote:
Stephen Lebans has a utility that embeds the output of Snapshot
Format inside an RTF file so that it can be viewed with any Word
processor that handles RTF files.


Thats right, but the RTF format has some limitations so you can't get
exactly the Report, unless you are using the special Wort-RTF-Format
and then the user needs word.


I am not familiar with these limitations you are talking about. Exporting
directly to RTF has SEVERE limitations, but I have not heard of anything
that limits what you get using Stephen's utility.

Needing Word is a problem? So you have a target audience that wont have
Word, can't or won't intall the Snapshot Viewer, but they will always have a
PDF viewer? Are they using Macs or Linux?

--
I don't check the Email account attached
to this message. Send instead to...
RBrandt at Hunter dot com


  #8  
Old June 28th, 2005, 09:24 PM
Mark Andrews
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Posts: n/a
Default

There are third party tools to create pdf files. However you need to
basically code how the output appears in the pdf. Access reports are
usually printed to pdf.

Best bet is to deal with the distribution of your application so it also
installs the pdf printer driver and at runtime changes to the pdf driver and
changes back to whatever printer was choosen.

You can buy our code if need to plug into your MDB to create pdfs, but it
just works with a few of the pdf drivers.

My two cents,
Mark
RPT Software
http://www.rptsoftware.com


"Dieter Liessmann" wrote in message
...
Hi,
I am searching a solution to create PDFs from Access-Report without a
PDF-Printer.
All solutions I have found (Adobe, Ghostscript, Fineprint....) need a
installed PDF-Printer-Driver.

My Application will be installed on hundreds of different machines, so I
didn't want to get in trouble with all the administrators to install the
right driver.

It is no Problem to pay for a professional solution, but all controls I
found need a installed PDF or EPS Printer.

Perhaps Stephan Lebans way to create native EMF from SNP files is a way
(Report - EMF -PDF)?
But Stephens EMF-solution has some small restrictions :-(.

Any hints ?

Or is there somebody who writes such a tool for cash?

--
So long Dieter



  #9  
Old June 28th, 2005, 11:35 PM
Stephen Lebans
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

There is one and only one limitation documented on the ReportUtilties
site and in the source code. Further it is a limitation of the Snapshot
format not the final RTF output. THe Snapshot format encodes output
designed by the Access Report design Line tool as a series of private
Enhanced Metafile records.

So what exactly are you talking about Dieter?
--

HTH
Stephen Lebans
http://www.lebans.com
Access Code, Tips and Tricks
Please respond only to the newsgroups so everyone can benefit.


"Dieter Liessmann" wrote in message
...
Rick Brandt wrote:
Stephen Lebans has a utility that embeds the output of Snapshot
Format inside an RTF file so that it can be viewed with any Word
processor that handles RTF files.


Thats right, but the RTF format has some limitations so you can't get
exactly the Report, unless you are using the special Wort-RTF-Format

and
then the user needs word.

--
So long Dieter


  #10  
Old June 30th, 2005, 08:21 AM
Dieter Liessmann
external usenet poster
 
Posts: n/a
Default

Hi Stepen,

Stephen Lebans wrote:
There is one and only one limitation documented on the ReportUtilties
site and in the source code. Further it is a limitation of the
Snapshot format not the final RTF output. THe Snapshot format encodes
output designed by the Access Report design Line tool as a series of
private Enhanced Metafile records.

So what exactly are you talking about Dieter?


Sorry for my inaccuracy.
I have tested your ReportUtilitis with some of my reports. The result was a
RTF-File without lines. The result from exporting the same reports to snp
and show with the viewer was correct. So I thought this is a limitation of
your tool.

The method "replace Lines with rectangles or linedrawing" is no option for
me because i have many different Applications with hundreds of reports. All
these applications are already running.

My favorite is still PDF not RTF because my customers prefer it and today
PDF is the most used and most accepted format for e-documents.

So my question to the reportMaster himself ;-):
Wouldn't you write a tool that creates PDFs from Access-Report without a
PDF-Printer?


--
So long Dieter

 




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