OpenOffice For Batch Converting PowerPoint to HTML/PDF/etc?

Posted August 1, 2007

I’d like to convert a number of powerpoint presentations to something more friendly for browsing; ideally HTML/jpg or flash, or less ideally PDF. I’m looking for some sort of command line utility to do this in OSX and/or Linux.

OpenOffice seems like a likely candidate - it does a nice job of importing powerpoint, and can print to the formats I’m looking for. I can’t seem to find a command-line oriented way of interacting with it, however.

I know OpenOffice supports APIs for interacting with it, and is accessible via Perl (example here). It also seems there’s a commandline option (-p and -pt) to print files, although I can’t get those to work.

Does anyone know of a way to get OpenOffice to convert Powerpoint files to HTML/Flash/etc via the commandline on a server (no X11)?

9 Comments so far

  1. KingMarsh on August 1st, 2007

    What you need may be a PowerPoint to Flash Programming Library.
    If you have a look at this, you may find some workaround.
    PPT2Flash SDK
    http://www.sameshow.com/powerpoint-to-flash-sdk.html

  2. Parand Darugar on August 1st, 2007

    KingMarsh, that does look like an interesting library, but I’m looking for something that will run under Linux/OSX and preferably is free.

    Here’s a thread on the OpenOffice forum that has related instructions:
    http://www.oooforum.org/forum/viewtopic.phtml?t=11890

    Looks like you can create a macro to do the conversion, start openoffice “headless” (ie. without display), and invoke the macro. Not the prettiest thing in the world, but apparently it works. At some point I’ll give it a try and document how it goes.

    “Convert format X to Y” apparently is a frequently asked question on the openoffice forums; here’s just one of many threads that includes a summary of techniques and past discussions:
    http://www.oooforum.org/forum/viewtopic.phtml?p=41636&highlight=commandline+options#41636

    Given that it’s such a frequently requested feature, perhaps the OO folks will be kind enough to make it available as a command line option at some point in time…

  3. Freiman on August 1st, 2007

    Does sameshow work in Linux? :)

  4. Ayaz on August 2nd, 2007

    I have used: http://www.primopdf.com/, it works well. It has settings to designate what resolution of output, how to hand images embedded or raster and a host of other knobs and swithces. The printer driver pdf generator is free.

    doesnt look like linux support. But can implement in win and wrap with a WS.

  5. Maha on September 4th, 2007

    HELLO!!!

    if you want to make a high-quality film out of your powerpoint presentations, I can advise the program on visifly.com (VisiPPT)
    I found it not so a long ago, but it very likes me. you can also use it.

    Maha:)

  6. Ishu on September 25th, 2007

    Hello KingMarsh,

    Were you able to install OO successfully on the shared linux server. Any help with conversion of PPT? please let me know.. I am in a similar fix..

    Thanks.

  7. John Ellingsworth on November 12th, 2007

    You can use the macro at this page to accomplish what you need to do. I have modified the macro to allow me to specifiy the output format, so I can batch convert any OO compatible document to any available output format, including HTML, PDF, Flash, etc.

    http://www.oooforum.org/forum/viewtopic.phtml?p=73714

    Hope this helps.

    John

  8. Standard Deviations » Convert Documents From doc/ppt/xls/etc to html/pdf/flash/etc Using OpenOffice.org on January 2nd, 2008

    [...] a long time I’ve wanted a solution for converting documents into easily digestible formats - namely, I [...]

  9. Levien on April 4th, 2008

    PyODConverter seems like a nice solution for match-converting Powerpoint and other Office douments:

    http://www.artofsolving.com/opensource/pyodconverter
    http://www.oooninja.com/2008/02/batch-command-line-file-conversion-with.html

    -L.

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