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Archival and Retrieval capability in PDF format

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2007-08-02 11:24:30
alos
Registered: Aug 2 2007
Posts: 2

I am using MS Word and using the mail merge feature to create 40,000 reports 5 pages each with an Excell spreadsheet that has the 40,000 records. I am looking to archive and retrieve the 40,000 reports in a pdf format but not as one PDF file but idividually based on a unique field in the Excell spreadsheet DB. Summary: How can I archive/Retrieve these 40,000 generated reports in 40,000 PDF format reports - I am looking for a any Adobe product -Thanks

My Product Information:
Acrobat Standard 8.0999999999999996447286321199499070644378662109375, Windows
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2007-08-04 19:00:29
#1
dthanna
ExpertTeam
Registered: Sep 28 2005
Posts: 248
What you are asking of Word and Excel are, quite frankly, beyond what either product was intended or tested against. I speak from a great deal of nashing of teeth and banging of head in this area.

However, I do not wish to disuate you from your quest, but am here to help you with a solution, even if it isn't what you are expecting.

To start off with, what you are looking for a is document archive and retrieval system. Adobe Systems does not have one of those at this time.

You could go with an off the shelf product, but your document volumes are much lower than even the lower-end products are designed to handle.

I would not even attempt to use Excel. It is an over-glorified flat-file system and a poor substitute for what you need.

I would suggest looking at using an actual Relational Database (free (freeDB, MySQL, etc., commercial (Oracle, DB2, SQL Server), doesn't matter). The primary thing is for it to support BLOB data types - (Binary Large OBjets). You setup a table - 40K rows long, indexed on your key field(s) with one of the touples (columns) being the BLOB type in which you store the PDF.

You will find it to be much more stable, scalable, multi-user, web-enableable, etc. than excel or any other flat-file toplogy will support.

Good luck!

Douglas Hanna is a member of the Production Print Technology team at Aon.
www.aonhewitt.com

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