Scripting Acrobat with VB

PDF Conference 23 November 2002

Robert Anderson - Publishing Technologist

E-mail: BobAnderson@mac.com

Presentations and scripts:

homepage.mac.com/bobanderson

Topics

Why Scripting?

Scripting Languages for Acrobat

How to get started

VB sample

Resources

Why Scripting?

Doing the same manual operations over and over again with Acrobat?

Scripting provides a way to combine many manual steps into a single operation.

Visual Basic is powerful

Create custom GUI

Control multiple programs

Create a custom workflow

Create installable .exe apps

Include JavaScript and Perl

JavaScript

Internal to Acrobat

Cross-platform

Access other aspects of ACRO SDK Art Box

Bleed Box

Trim Box

Perl

The quintessential file munger

We use it to repair PS files before Distilling

Runs on virtually every computer platform

Wicked fast

Callable with VB Shell function

Getting Started with VB

In-house training

Course at local college

Buy a tutorial from local bookstore Includes Visual Basic 6 Learning Edition

Learn how to create a GUIand write simple apps

VB Demo Sample: Check Papersize

Select PDF file

Open with Acrobat

Get papersize of page 1

Compare with other pages

Display non-matching pages

File Open Dialog Box

Dim filename As String

cdbOpen.Flags = &H1000 file must exist

cdbOpen.ShowOpen

filename = cdbOpen.filename

MsgBox (filename)

Launch Acrobat

Set gAcro = CreateObject("AcroExch.App")

Set newPD = CreateObject("AcroExch.PDDoc")

Set newAV = CreateObject("AcroExch.AVDoc")

gAcro.Show

Open & Display PDF

OK = newPD.open(filename)

If Not OK Then

MsgBox ("Could not open PDF file: " + filename)

Exit Sub

End If

Set newAV = newPD.openAVDoc("Paper Size Check")

Get size of page 1

Set newPage = newPD.AcquirePage(0)

x1 = newPage.GetSize.x

y1 = newPage.GetSize.y

Make a list of bad pages

j = 0

For i = 1 To newPD.GetNumPages

Set newPage = newPD.AcquirePage(i - 1)

If (x1 newPage.GetSize.x) And(y1 newPage.GetSize.y) Then

j = j + 1

badpages(j) = I

End If

Next I

Display bad pages

For i = 1 To j

k = badpages(i)

newAV.GetAVPageView.Goto (k)

Set newPage = newPD.AcquirePage(k - 1)

xk = newPage.GetSize.x

yk = newPage.GetSize.y

MsgBox ("Page: " + Str(k) + " Size: + Str(xk) + " x " + Str(yk))

Next i

Resources

VB Books from computer bookstore

Adobe SDK documentation

Newgroups

User Forums and Email lists

Collegues and friends

Adobe Acrobat Docs

http://partners.adobe.com

Acrobat SDK files IACOverview Tech Note 5164

IACReference.pdf Tech Note 5465

VBJavaScript.pdf Tech Note 5417

CoreAPIReference.pdf Tech Note 5191

Tell VB to reference acrobat.tlb(comes with Acrobat)

Newsgroups

comp.lang.visual.basic comp.text.pdf

Searching newsgroups: http://groups.google.com/

Search for the name of newsgroup

Then, search for your topic

http://groups.goodle.com

User forums and mailing lists

http://pdfzone.com/resources/discussions.html

http://forum.planetpdf.com/scripts/wbpx.dll/~planetpdfforum

http://www.adobe.com/support/forums/main.html

Select Folder using standard VB objects:

Select Folder code from newsgroup:

Adobe watches newsgroups & forums

Dov Issacs frequents the PDF Discussion list

Adobe Support MarketPlace $ but effective

Get answers from Adobe support

Bugs often fixed in next release

Best time: just after major point release

Reporting bugs to Adobe

http://www.adobe.com/support/marketplace.html

The End