Convert Word doc, docx and Excel xls, xlsx to PDF with PHP

Question

I am looking for a way to convert Word and Excel files to PDF using PHP.

The reason for this, is I need to be able to combine files of various formats into one document. I know that if I am able to convert everything to PDF I can then merge the PDFs into one file using PDFMerger (which uses fpdf).

I am already able to create PDFs from other file types / images, but am stuck with Word Docs. (I think I would possibly be able to convert the Excel files using the PHPExcel library that I already use to create Excel files from html code).

I do not use the Zend Framework, so am hoping that someone will be able to point me in the right direction.

Alternatively, if there is a way to create image (jpg) files from the Word documents, that would be workable.

Thanks for any help!

Answer 1

I found a solution to my issue and after a request, will post it here to help others. Apologies if I missed any details, it's been a while since I worked on this solution.

The first thing that is required is to install Openoffice.org on the server. I requested my hosting provider to install the open office RPM on my VPS. This can be done through WHM directly.

Now that the server has the capability to handle MS Office files you are able to convert the files by executing command line instructions via PHP. To handle this, I found PyODConverter: https://github.com/mirkonasato/pyodconverter

I created a directory on the server and placed the PyODConverter python file within it. I also created a plain text file above the web root (I named it "adocpdf"), with the following command line instructions in it:

directory=$1
filename=$2
extension=$3
SERVICE='soffice'
if [ "`ps ax|grep -v grep|grep -c $SERVICE`" -lt 1 ]; then 
unset DISPLAY
/usr/bin/soffice -headless -accept="socket,host=127.0.0.1,port=8100;urp;" -nofirststartwizard & 
sleep 5s
fi
python /home/website/python/DocumentConverter.py /home/website/$directory$filename$extension /home/website/$directory$filename.pdf

This checks that the openoffice.org libraries are running and then calls the PyODConverter script to process the file and output it as a PDF. The 3 variables on the first three lines are provided when the script is executed from with a PHP file. The delay ("sleep 5s") is used to ensure that openoffice.org has enough to time to initiate if required. I have used this for months now and the 5s gap seems to give enough breathing room.

The script will create a PDF version of the document in the same directory as the original.

Finally, initiating the conversion of a Word / Excel file from within PHP (I have it within a function that checks if the file we are dealing with is a word / excel document)...

//use openoffice.org
$output = array();
$return_var = 0;
exec("/opt/adocpdf {$directory} {$filename} {$extension}", $output, $return_var);

This PHP function is called once the Word / Excel file has been uploaded to the server. The 3 variables in the exec() call relate directly to the 3 at the start of the plain text script above. Note that the $directory variable requires no leading forward slash if the file for conversion is within the web root.

OK, that's it! Hopefully this will be useful to someone and save them the difficulties and learning curve I faced.