Excelguru Help Site - Printing Worksheets To A PDF File (Using Late Binding)

Introduction:
This article contains code examples to print worksheets to PDF files, using PDFCreator.

These code examples are built for PDFCreator, an open source PDF writer utility. Unlike Adobe Acrobat and CutePDF, which both require pro versions to create PDF's via code, PDFCreator is completely free! Download PDF Creator from Sourceforge here. Please note that this code will NOT work with Adobe Acrobat.

It should also be noted that each of the examples in this section use a Late Bind. If you are not familiar with the difference between Early and Late Binding, please read our article on Early vs Late binding.

Routines Included In This Article:

Print a Single Worksheet to a PDF File
Print Multiple Worksheets to Multiple PDF Files
Print Multiple Worksheets to a Single PDF File

Versions Tested:
These routines were tested successfully using PDFCreator 0.9.1, GPLGhostscript.exe download package, on Windows XP Pro (SP2). Excel versions tested include:

Excel 2003
Excel 2007

NOTE: Before you "go it alone" with trying to adapt any of these routines, you may want to read this article, which shares some of the idiosyncrasies discovered in the development of the PDFCreator code samples.

Print a Single Worksheet to a PDF File:

Code:

Option Explicit
Sub PrintToPDF_Late()
'Author       : Ken Puls (www.excelguru.ca)
'Macro Purpose: Print to PDF file using PDFCreator
'   (Download from http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator/)
'   Designed for late bind, no references req'd
    Dim pdfjob As Object
    Dim sPDFName As String
    Dim sPDFPath As String

    '/// Change the output file name here! ///
    sPDFName = "testPDF.pdf"
    sPDFPath = ActiveWorkbook.Path & Application.PathSeparator

    'Check if worksheet is empty and exit if so
    If IsEmpty(ActiveSheet.UsedRange) Then Exit Sub
    Set pdfjob = CreateObject("PDFCreator.clsPDFCreator")
    With pdfjob
        If .cStart("/NoProcessingAtStartup") = False Then
            MsgBox "Can't initialize PDFCreator.", vbCritical + _
                vbOKOnly, "PrtPDFCreator"
            Exit Sub
        End If
        .cOption("UseAutosave") = 1
        .cOption("UseAutosaveDirectory") = 1
        .cOption("AutosaveDirectory") = sPDFPath
        .cOption("AutosaveFilename") = sPDFName
        .cOption("AutosaveFormat") = 0    ' 0 = PDF
        .cClearCache
    End With

    'Print the document to PDF
    ActiveSheet.PrintOut copies:=1, ActivePrinter:="PDFCreator"

    'Wait until the print job has entered the print queue
    Do Until pdfjob.cCountOfPrintjobs = 1
        DoEvents
    Loop
    pdfjob.cPrinterStop = False

    'Wait until the file shows up before closing PDF Creator
    Do
        DoEvents
    Loop Until Dir(sPDFPath & sPDFName) = sPDFName

    pdfjob.cClose
    Set pdfjob = Nothing
End Sub

Print Multiple Worksheets to Multiple PDF Files:

Code:

Option Explicit
Sub PrintToPDF_MultiSheet_Late()
'Author       : Ken Puls (www.excelguru.ca)
'Macro Purpose: Print to PDF file using PDFCreator
'   (Download from http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator/)
'   Designed for late bind, no references req'd
    Dim pdfjob As Object
    Dim sPDFName As String
    Dim sPDFPath As String
    Dim lSheet As Long

    Set pdfjob = CreateObject("PDFCreator.clsPDFCreator")
    sPDFPath = ActiveWorkbook.Path & Application.PathSeparator
    If pdfjob.cStart("/NoProcessingAtStartup") = False Then
        MsgBox "Can't initialize PDFCreator.", vbCritical + _
            vbOKOnly, "PrtPDFCreator"
        Exit Sub
    End If

    For lSheet = 1 To ActiveWorkbook.Sheets.Count
        'Check if worksheet is empty and skip if so
        If Not IsEmpty(ActiveSheet.UsedRange) Then
            With pdfjob
                '/// Change the output file name here! ///
                sPDFName = "testPDF" & Sheets(lSheet).Name & ".pdf"
                .cOption("UseAutosave") = 1
                .cOption("UseAutosaveDirectory") = 1
                .cOption("AutosaveDirectory") = sPDFPath
                .cOption("AutosaveFilename") = sPDFName
                .cOption("AutosaveFormat") = 0    ' 0 = PDF
                .cClearCache
            End With
    
            'Print the document to PDF
            Worksheets(lSheet).PrintOut copies:=1, ActivePrinter:="PDFCreator"
    
            'Wait until the print job has entered the print queue
            Do Until pdfjob.cCountOfPrintjobs = 1
                DoEvents
            Loop
            pdfjob.cPrinterStop = False
    
            'Wait until the file shows up before closing PDF Creator
            Do
                DoEvents
            Loop Until Dir(sPDFPath & sPDFName) = sPDFName
        End If
    Next lSheet

    pdfjob.cClose
    Set pdfjob = Nothing
End Sub

Print Multiple Worksheets to a Single PDF File

Code:

Option Explicit
Sub PrintToPDF_MultiSheetToOne_Late()
'Author       : Ken Puls (www.excelguru.ca)
'Macro Purpose: Print to PDF file using PDFCreator
'   (Download from http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator/)
'   Designed for late bind, no references req'd
    Dim pdfjob As Object
    Dim sPDFName As String
    Dim sPDFPath As String
    Dim lSheet As Long
    Dim lTtlSheets As Long

    '/// Change the output file name here!  ///
    sPDFName = "Consolidated.pdf"
    sPDFPath = ActiveWorkbook.Path & Application.PathSeparator
    Set pdfjob = CreateObject("PDFCreator.clsPDFCreator")

    'Make sure the PDF printer can start
    If pdfjob.cStart("/NoProcessingAtStartup") = False Then
        MsgBox "Can't initialize PDFCreator.", vbCritical + _
            vbOKOnly, "Error!"
        Exit Sub
    End If

    'Set all defaults
    With pdfjob
        .cOption("UseAutosave") = 1
        .cOption("UseAutosaveDirectory") = 1
        .cOption("AutosaveDirectory") = sPDFPath
        .cOption("AutosaveFilename") = sPDFName
        .cOption("AutosaveFormat") = 0    ' 0 = PDF
        .cClearCache
    End With

    'Print the document to PDF
    lTtlSheets = Application.Sheets.Count
    For lSheet = 1 To Application.Sheets.Count
        On Error Resume Next 'To deal with chart sheets
        If Not IsEmpty(Application.Sheets(lSheet).UsedRange) Then
            Application.Sheets(lSheet).PrintOut copies:=1, ActivePrinter:="PDFCreator"
        Else
            lTtlSheets = lTtlSheets - 1
        End If
        On Error GoTo 0
    Next lSheet

    'Wait until all print jobs have entered the print queue
    Do Until pdfjob.cCountOfPrintjobs = lTtlSheets
        DoEvents
    Loop

    'Combine all PDFs into a single file and start the printer
    With pdfjob
        .cCombineAll
        .cPrinterStop = False
    End With

    'Wait until the file shows up before closing PDF Creator
    Do
        DoEvents
    Loop Until Dir(sPDFPath & sPDFName) = sPDFName

    pdfjob.cClose
    Set pdfjob = Nothing
End Sub

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