RTTSoftware Support Forum

PDF Explorer => Ideas/Suggestions => Topic started by: singlemalt8 on June 18, 2009, 11:42:57 PM

Title: Automation & Scripting
Post by: singlemalt8 on June 18, 2009, 11:42:57 PM
I was looking for a way to avoid needing Acrobat to run scripts to modify Info Fields.  I have already received a very fast response on this subject by email, but wanted to share the feature request for others to comment on....

If anybody has other solutions I would love to hear them.  All in all, PDF Explorer has helped me a lot.


ORIGINAL COMMENT:
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The ability to quickly browse many PDF files with metadata fields is excellent and has saved me many hours of work.  I do wish your "batch" feature included a way to allow scripting or calculations for filling in the Info fields.
 
In my case, I am viewing over 1000 pdf's with PDF Explorer, go back and use Acrobat scripts to fill in the fields, and then re-check for errors with PDF Explorer.
 
Type of calculation is string manipulation.  I created files naming such as MODEL_REGION_LANGUAGE_TYPE.pdf, and parse that into the info fields.
 
If this is possible, I would be very interested.
 
Still love the tool, but wish I had this type of feature ((and I am sure others do too).

RESPONSE:
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Right now such functionality is not directly possible, despite the fact the new, in development stage, version, already has something, the Dynamic Calculated Columns, that can be used, indirectly, for that.

Even so, you can use the Export/Import technique, and an external tool to generate these fields data.
You just need to export the PDFE grid, containing the files you want to update, to a .csv  file (File>Export grid fields...), select all the fields of the, at right, list, except the custom you don't use, and save the grid to the .csv file.
Now you need to use an external tool to edit the .csv file in order to fill the fields with the data you need. Probably MS Excel, and its huge scripting potential, can do the job. When done, you just need to Import again the .csv using the PDF Explorer File>Import wizard to enter that new metadata into the PDF Explorer database, and respective pdf files.

Another option is to use an external script language to calculate that metadata and then call my other tool, PDF-ShellTools, command line interface, to set it into the PDFs.
http://rttsoftware.googlepages.com/STIndex.htm?pageURL=InfoEdit.htm#cmdline