[grimreaper46]

I was thinking of using this App to page turn my music files. I do have a question. This would apply to Android devices and my Windows 11 Lap Top. The question is that most of my music is in Microsoft Word files. Can I use the MobileSheets App to select a file from Word to use with my Page turner foot pedal? I only have the free Adobe App and hence can not modify these files. Thanks for any help.

[Geoff Bacon]

MS doesn't handle Word files - you would need to use Word to open each file and write it to a "pdf printer" - I use Cutepdf but others are available  (including "Microsoft Print To PDF" that I believe is standard on a Win 10+ system)
Doing this, converts the word document into a pdf which you can then import into MS.

If you do this, test on one or two files first to check it is what you want.
Having established the method, convert a large number of files into a new, dedicated folder. Having created the pdf's, perform a block import to get them into MS (faster than doing one at a time). 
Should you need to do it in chunks, empty the dedicated folder after you have imported a chunk of files; you can then import everything that gets subsequently created in the folder.

Geoff

[grimreaper46]

MS doesn't handle Word files - you would need to use Word to open each file and write it to a "pdf printer" - I use Cutepdf but others are available  (including "Microsoft Print To PDF" that I believe is standard on a Win 10+ system)
Doing this, converts the word document into a pdf which you can then import into MS.

If you do this, test on one or two files first to check it is what you want.
Having established the method, convert a large number of files into a new, dedicated folder. Having created the pdf's, perform a block import to get them into MS (faster than doing one at a time). 
Should you need to do it in chunks, empty the dedicated folder after you have imported a chunk of files; you can then import everything that gets subsequently created in the folder.

Geoff

Thanks for that. I didn't realise that I can just convert my Word document to a PDF format file easily in Word and then just use the PDF file. I have already converted about 10 word files and Imported them into MS. just waiting for my footswitch tomorrow.

[Zubersoft]

At some point I'm going to upgrade the PDF library I'm using, and the more expensive version of the library supports rendering Microsoft Word files. I need to test this to see how well it works, but if the quality is acceptable, then I'm going to add support for adding Word files directly to MobileSheets.

Mike

[grimreaper46]

At some point I'm going to upgrade the PDF library I'm using, and the more expensive version of the library supports rendering Microsoft Word files. I need to test this to see how well it works, but if the quality is acceptable, then I'm going to add support for adding Word files directly to MobileSheets.

Mike

Great. Will you post if you are successful.How much is the upgrade.

[Zubersoft]

I will post once I've tested out the the updated PDF library and have made a decision about moving forward with the upgrade.

Mike

[paltieldav]

You can use MobileSheets to work with music files, but there's a catch for Word documents. MobileSheets is designed to work best with PDFs. The easiest way to go about it is to convert your Word files into PDFs, and then you can use them with your page-turner foot pedal. Since you mentioned using only the free Adobe app, you won't be able to modify those PDFs after conversion, but you can find free Word-to-PDF converters online.
If you need to edit those Word files before converting them, consider upgrading to Microsoft Office Professional subscription. It's a handy option for managing and editing Word documents across devices.

[BRX]

Don't forget you can directly save your Word-files as PDF from Word (though there is no batch converting in Word AFAIK).

[Lawrie]

Don't forget you can directly save your Word-files as PDF from Word (though there is no batch converting in Word AFAIK).

While true, I've found that such PDFs are often very large in comparison to other ways of creating them.  E.G. I use a PDF printer application that presents to Windows as a printer.  Many of my PDFs are around 1/10th or less than the size they would be if generated directly by Word.

To demonstrate, I just did a quick test.  I created a document that contained the word "test" at 72 point.
Export to PDF from Word = 176k
Print to PDF using PDF24 = 11k

Guess which one I use...

[IanMSpencer]

I'd guess the Export is intended to be editable in Adobe, whereas the print version is a minimal rendering.

I used Word itself to generate PDFs automatically. As I was hacking, it is very rough and ready - I didn't properly deal with file extensions but used PowerToys PowerRename to remove the extension afterward because I really couldn't be bothered.

In Word 365 the developer tab is hidden, so first you need to enable the tools by right clicking on the ribbon and on the right hand panel, click on the empty box by the developer menu. Then View Macros. Create a macro then use something like this:

Code:

Sub CreatePDFs()
'
' CreatePDFs Macro
'
'
    Dim vDirectory As String
    Dim oDoc As Document
   
    vDirectory = "C:\Users\ianms\OneDrive\Documents\Tabs\Songs\"

    vFile = Dir(vDirectory & "*.docx")

    Do While vFile <> ""
        On Error Resume Next
        Set oDoc = Documents.Open(FileName:=vDirectory & vFile)
        On Error GoTo NextDoc
        ActiveDocument.SaveAs2 FileName:=vDirectory & "\PDFs\" & oDoc.Name & ".pdf", _
                              FileFormat:=17
        oDoc.Close SaveChanges:=False
NextDoc:
       
        vFile = Dir
    Loop


End Sub

It's very hacky, borrowed from elsewhere (I tried a command line code but Word doesn't seem to offer a COM model now without some faff & it's a decade since I bothered programming anything as a matter of principle. I set up a subdirectory to keep life simple. I then re-ran it for rtf and doc extensions. You will need to check the output, especially as the old RTF files from WordPad (I've been collecting tabs for a long time) were very inconsistent on page breaks. If Word is maximised when you run it, it may induce a fit with the flashing screen, but it didn't annoy when kicked off when small. A couple of seconds per document, so pretty useful.

[Lawrie]

I'd guess the Export is intended to be editable in Adobe, whereas the print version is a minimal rendering.
<snip>

Maybe, but I'm more inclined to put it down to everything micro$oft does is like me, significantly overweight 

FWIW I don't use adobe products at all, nor am I any kind of programmer, but other PDF tools seem to handle edits and markups of my printed* PDFs just fine.

* I've used a variety of PDF printer apps over the years and they all seem to have produced perfectly compliant PDF documents so although I didn't test it, I'd be surprised if Adobe was unable to correctly edit these files.  There is no doubt Mobile Sheets handles them perfectly too.