Enhanced Batch Processing

Overview

Enhanced Batch Processing lets you convert documents to Flash programmatically without user assistance using operating system command line. Enhanced Batch Processing is available only in Server mode. Another option for automatic document conversion in Server mode is Print2Flash OLE Automation API.

Command Line Syntax

Enhanced Batch Processing is activated when launching Print2Flash Server application from operating system command line with certain parameters. The command line syntax is as follows:

p2fserver.exe sourcefilename [outputfilename] [options]

OR

p2fserver.exe sourcefiledir[\filemask] [outputdirname] [options]

The first syntax option is used for conversion of a single file while the second - for conversion of multiple files in a directory. You may need to specify full path to the p2fserver.exe which is a Print2Flash Server executable and is located in the same directory where Print2Flash is installed, e.g. "C:\Program Files\Print2Flash". This path is chosen at Print2Flash setup on the Choose Destination Location screen.

There are following parameters:

• sourcefilename - the name of the document to convert. For example, to convert a document named c:\MyDoc.doc use "c:\MyDoc.doc" as this parameter value;
• outputfilename – specifies the output filename. If this parameter is omitted, the file is named after the original document with .swf extension appended to the original document name;
• sourcefiledir - the name of the directory where the documents to convert reside;
• filemask - the mask for the files to convert, e.g. "*.doc". If this argument is not specified, all files are attempted to convert. For example, to convert all Microsoft Word (with .doc extension) documents use "*.doc" value;
• outputdirname – specifies the output folder to which all converted documents will be written. The files are named after the original file names with .swf extension appended to the names. For example, if a file was named MyDoc.doc, the converted document will be named MyDoc.doc.swf.

If any file name or path parameters contain spaces, they must be enclosed in double quotes. In options parameter you can list one or more options. Most options corresponds to the properties and methods of Print2Flash OLE Automation API objects. The general syntax of an option is:

/OptionName:OptionValue

Here OptionName is the name of the option from the table below, and OptionValue specifies the option value and must be of the type specified in the table.  For example, to specify German document interface language, you need to specify this option:

/Language:de

The available options are listed in the table below.

Using Enhanced Batch Processing

To launch Print2Flash in batch mode, click Start button in Windows and select Run. In the opened dialog window type the command line according to the syntax and click OK.

Then Print2Flash is launched in the background (without user interface) and starts converting specified documents. After a document is converted, the output Print2Flash document file is created in the specified output folder. Note that though Print2Flash is launched without user interface in batch processing mode, the applications which send documents to Print2Flash may display user interface.

If you feel that there is a problem with document conversion, use /LogFileName option to create a log file. It lists all important events occurred at conversion including successful conversions and errors and should help you in diagnosing the cause of the problem.

Examples

The following example converts a document named "C:\MyDocs\Report.xls" to Flash document named "C:\MyDocs\Report.xls.swf" and enables only Drag, Select Text, Previous Page and Next Page buttons in the resulting Flash document:

p2fserver.exe C:\MyDocs\Report.xls /InterfaceOptions:646

The next example converts all documents in a directory named "C:\MyDocs" to Flash documents written into "C:\FlashDocs" directory and disables printing and copying text from the resulting Flash documents:

p2fserver.exe C:\MyDocs C:\FlashDocs /ProtectionOptions:3

The example below converts a document named "C:\MyDocs\Conference.txt"  to a Flash document named "D:\Publish\Report2.swf" selecting Landscape page orientation and Letter paper size for the output file pages:

p2fserver.exe C:\MyDocs\Conference.txt D:\Publish\Report2.swf /FormName:Letter /Orientation:2