Windows Print to PDF recommendations
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The Microsoft Print to PDF is great when you need a single one-off type of PDF.
But if you have a process where you want to append additional prints(PDFs) to an existing PDF, the Microsoft version is a complete failure!
There are several options out there:
CutePDF - Free (on Cholocately)
PrimoPDF - Free
PDF Creator - Free (on Cholocately)I was wondering if you lot had one you loved, one that's free, currently maintainted, and would be even better if it's in Chocolatey.
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@Dashrender we use Foxit but I think the free version now doesn't have pdf print, have to check.
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Our preference is:
PDF X-Change Printer LiteWe started using PDF-Xchange Printer Lite when you could buy the full version independently. Now you can only get the full version as part of another product.
We currently have PDF-Xchange Editor (includes PDF-Xchange Printer Lite) on every workstation. Not sure if we could survive without now, it has become part of our daily tools.
Lands in the LOVE category you asked for....not the free category; not sure about Chocolatey.
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Libre office works well to, especially if you have additional needs besides just appending.
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Pdf Creator is very good.
We use it with large Acad drawings and the speed and quality are great.
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@JasGot FREE only for non-commercial use
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@DustinB3403 said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
Libre office works well to, especially if you have additional needs besides just appending.
LOL - no chance in hell I'm deploying Libre Office just for this.
and management has said hell no to Libre Office for replacing MS Office
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@VoIP_n00b said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
@JasGot FREE only for non-commercial use
@JasGot said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
Our preference is:
PDF X-Change Printer LiteWe started using PDF-Xchange Printer Lite when you could buy the full version independently. Now you can only get the full version as part of another product.
We currently have PDF-Xchange Editor (includes PDF-Xchange Printer Lite) on every workstation. Not sure if we could survive without now, it has become part of our daily tools.
Lands in the LOVE category you asked for....not the free category; not sure about Chocolatey.
He did mention it's not free
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@Dashrender said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
management has said hell no to Libre Office for replacing MS Office
I have yet to see a business using Libre Office.
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@Dashrender said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
@DustinB3403 said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
Libre office works well to, especially if you have additional needs besides just appending.
LOL - no chance in hell I'm deploying Libre Office just for this.
and management has said hell no to Libre Office for replacing MS Office
Who said anything as a replacement for MS Office?
You said you wanted to tool to append PDF pages together, I mentioned a tool that works well for that purpose.
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@VoIP_n00b said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
@Dashrender said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
management has said hell no to Libre Office for replacing MS Office
I have yet to see a business using Libre Office.
I think a greenfield setup could go that direction pretty easily - as long as they aren't receiving a ton of MS based documents that wind up with formatting issues.
In my case we have 100's or more Word and Excel files, the Word files all would have had to been updated to be formatted correctly - no thanks.
and for us, we're on the verge of moving to O365, so our need for local Office is hopefully short lived except for a few corporate type jobs (accounting). Everyone else should easily be able to use the online versions of Word/Excel.And isn't that the case for most? How many people today really need a locally installed version of office? 1%? 5%? I know I can do 99.9% of my things in Excel online (I have started using pivot tables a lot - I guess I should check that).
Additionally - I've really taken to the thinking that office documents should RARELY be shared between companies. Most of them should be output to a PDF and sent that way. It frustrates me to no end when vendors send invoices in docx format or xlsx format. - Come on guys... I can edit these files and send them back and you might not even see my changes for that invoice - just WTF?
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@DustinB3403 said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
@Dashrender said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
@DustinB3403 said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
Libre office works well to, especially if you have additional needs besides just appending.
LOL - no chance in hell I'm deploying Libre Office just for this.
and management has said hell no to Libre Office for replacing MS Office
Who said anything as a replacement for MS Office?
You said you wanted to tool to append PDF pages together, I mentioned a tool that works well for that purpose.
Yeah - I went all JB on ya.. my bad..
none the less, I'm not going to install a massive package like Libre just for print to PDF - plus, I would be very surprised if it didn't try to take over docx, xlsx, etc.... just don't need want that hassle.
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@Dashrender said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
plus, I would be very surprised if it didn't try to take over docx, xlsx, etc.
Your Jared is showing again.
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@VoIP_n00b said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
@JasGot FREE only for non-commercial use
What's your point? (That wasn't already stated clearly in my post?)
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Replying to myself. Foxit 9 includes pritpdf for free, Foxit 10 does not, which is why my other I-T person hasn't deployed 10 yet.
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@jt1001001 said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
Replying to myself. Foxit 9 includes pritpdf for free, Foxit 10 does not, which is why my other I-T person hasn't deployed 10 yet.
Is 9 still getting updates? fixes?
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It was but updates I think stopped 2 months ago. Putting in plans to update to 10
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@VoIP_n00b said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
@Dashrender said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
management has said hell no to Libre Office for replacing MS Office
I have yet to see a business using Libre Office.
We used it at CW because of all the RHEL workstations. They had some pretty huge spreadsheets for thermal analysis in libre office.
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@Dashrender said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
@VoIP_n00b said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
@Dashrender said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
management has said hell no to Libre Office for replacing MS Office
I have yet to see a business using Libre Office.
I think a greenfield setup could go that direction pretty easily - as long as they aren't receiving a ton of MS based documents that wind up with formatting issues.
In my case we have 100's or more Word and Excel files, the Word files all would have had to been updated to be formatted correctly - no thanks.
and for us, we're on the verge of moving to O365, so our need for local Office is hopefully short lived except for a few corporate type jobs (accounting). Everyone else should easily be able to use the online versions of Word/Excel.And isn't that the case for most? How many people today really need a locally installed version of office? 1%? 5%? I know I can do 99.9% of my things in Excel online (I have started using pivot tables a lot - I guess I should check that).
Additionally - I've really taken to the thinking that office documents should RARELY be shared between companies. Most of them should be output to a PDF and sent that way. It frustrates me to no end when vendors send invoices in docx format or xlsx format. - Come on guys... I can edit these files and send them back and you might not even see my changes for that invoice - just WTF?
You can edit most pdfs also unless they flatten them. That aspect doesn't really change much.
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@stacksofplates said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
@Dashrender said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
@VoIP_n00b said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
@Dashrender said in Windows Print to PDF recommendations:
management has said hell no to Libre Office for replacing MS Office
I have yet to see a business using Libre Office.
I think a greenfield setup could go that direction pretty easily - as long as they aren't receiving a ton of MS based documents that wind up with formatting issues.
In my case we have 100's or more Word and Excel files, the Word files all would have had to been updated to be formatted correctly - no thanks.
and for us, we're on the verge of moving to O365, so our need for local Office is hopefully short lived except for a few corporate type jobs (accounting). Everyone else should easily be able to use the online versions of Word/Excel.And isn't that the case for most? How many people today really need a locally installed version of office? 1%? 5%? I know I can do 99.9% of my things in Excel online (I have started using pivot tables a lot - I guess I should check that).
Additionally - I've really taken to the thinking that office documents should RARELY be shared between companies. Most of them should be output to a PDF and sent that way. It frustrates me to no end when vendors send invoices in docx format or xlsx format. - Come on guys... I can edit these files and send them back and you might not even see my changes for that invoice - just WTF?
You can edit most pdfs also unless they flatten them. That aspect doesn't really change much.
Of course this is true, but normals, even normal office workers don't know that.
you can often even "edit" them in Word, by importing them, edit then save as PDF, but it's highly likely you'll break the formatting.But more to your point - I suppose we need a more indelible solution that doesn't cost an arm and a leg.
