PDFCreator + HotFolder = PNG not converted to PDF

How do I setup a HotFolder to automatically save PNG files as PDF files?

Want:  
1. Save PNG files to a folder monitored by HotFolder. 
2. PDFCreator automatically creates PDFs from the PNG files and saves the PDFs to a separate OUTPUT folder.

Steps taken:
1. Created PDFCreator profile for auto-saving PDFs.
2. Created separate PDFCreator printer for HotFolder, using profile above.
3. Created a HotFolder to monitor the folder and save to OUTPUT folder.

Results:
1. Save PNG files to a folder monitored by HotFolder.
2. Files get transferred to OUTPUT folder as PNG files--not PDF files.

OS:  Win7 Home Premium 64-bit
PDF Creator:  v2.0.2 
HotFolder:  v0.9.5493 

Hi,


please note the converted files will not save to the output folder specified in the HotFolder application, but to the folder which is used for auto-save in the PDFCreator. The output folder is the place where the source files get moved to after converting.

best regards,


Just double-checked the auto-save settings in PDFCreator.  The output folder specified in the profile is the same as the output folder specified in HotFolder setup.  


Would having the same folder specified in both places prevent PNGs from being converted PDFs?  I was expecting to find both PNGs and PDFs in the output folder.

Hi,


the output folder and autosave location can be the same, I just retested this here successfully. Does a PDF get created if you drag & drop it onto the PDFCreator startup window? What is your default application for viewing pngs?

best regards,


When I drag/drop the PNG onto the PDFCreator starup window, the standard Windows ‘Print Pictures’ dialog box is displayed.  Using the dialog box, I can select the desired layout and the PDFCreator printer.  Clicking on the Print key gives me a PDF in the OUTPUT folder.


My default image viewer is MycView.  I just switched the default viewer to XnView and got the same result (OUTPUT folder contains PNGs, but no PDFs).  What is your default PNG viewing application?

Hi,


the standard viewer here is the WIndows picture viewer. Are other filetypes converted successfully? 

best regards,


I tried a TXT and XLSX file.  Both converted to PDFs–although the spreadsheet didn’t turn out as expected.


I went back through all the settings today, and setup new input and output folders with only lower-case text naming (eliminating casing and underscores as the culprit for tripping up HotFolder).  IrfanView was set as the default image viewer, because of the customizability of the print dialog settings (in case that was part of the problem).

The result is the same…PNGs and JPGs are not saved to PDF–they are just transferred to the output folder.

I am having the same issue.  I can print jpg, jpeg to PDF using PDFCreator Pro, but HotFolder doesn’t work with images.  Please advise.

2016-01-27 12:37:39.2606 [Trace] 1264-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: Profiles:
2016-01-27 12:37:39.2762 [Trace] 1264-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings:
2016-01-27 12:37:39.2762 [Trace] 1264-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: High Compression (small file)
2016-01-27 12:37:39.2762 [Trace] 1264-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: High Quality (large file)
2016-01-27 12:37:39.2762 [Trace] 1264-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: JPEG (graphic file)
2016-01-27 12:37:39.2762 [Trace] 1264-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: PDF/A (long term preservation)
2016-01-27 12:37:39.2919 [Trace] 1264-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: PNG (graphic file)
2016-01-27 12:37:39.2919 [Trace] 1264-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: Print after saving
2016-01-27 12:37:39.2919 [Trace] 1264-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: TIFF (multipage graphic file)
2016-01-27 12:37:39.2919 [Info] 1264-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Startup.PrintFileStart.Run: Launched printjob with PrintFile command.
2016-01-27 12:37:39.3075 [Info] 1264-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Startup.PrintFileStart.Run: Using printer PDFCreator
2016-01-27 12:37:39.3543 [Error] 1264-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.PrintFile.PrintCommand.Print: Exception during print process
Type: System.NullReferenceException
Message: Object reference not set to an instance of an object.
2016-01-27 12:37:39.3543 [Error] 1264-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Startup.PrintFileStart.Run: The file “C:\Users\mikem\Desktop\images\1.jpg” could not be printed!
2016-01-27 12:37:39.3543 [Debug] 1264-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.App.App_OnStartup: Ending PDFCreator
2016-01-27 12:37:40.5049 [Trace] 4136-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: Profiles:
2016-01-27 12:37:40.5206 [Trace] 4136-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings:
2016-01-27 12:37:40.5206 [Trace] 4136-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: High Compression (small file)
2016-01-27 12:37:40.5206 [Trace] 4136-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: High Quality (large file)
2016-01-27 12:37:40.5206 [Trace] 4136-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: JPEG (graphic file)
2016-01-27 12:37:40.5206 [Trace] 4136-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: PDF/A (long term preservation)
2016-01-27 12:37:40.5206 [Trace] 4136-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: PNG (graphic file)
2016-01-27 12:37:40.5362 [Trace] 4136-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: Print after saving
2016-01-27 12:37:40.5362 [Trace] 4136-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Helper.SettingsHelper.LoadSettings: TIFF (multipage graphic file)
2016-01-27 12:37:40.5362 [Info] 4136-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Startup.PrintFileStart.Run: Launched printjob with PrintFile command.
2016-01-27 12:37:40.5518 [Info] 4136-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Startup.PrintFileStart.Run: Using printer PDFCreator
2016-01-27 12:37:40.5830 [Error] 4136-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.PrintFile.PrintCommand.Print: Exception during print process
Type: System.NullReferenceException
Message: Object reference not set to an instance of an object.
2016-01-27 12:37:40.5987 [Error] 4136-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.Startup.PrintFileStart.Run: The file “C:\Users\mikem\Desktop\images\2.jpg” could not be printed!
2016-01-27 12:37:40.5987 [Debug] 4136-1 (ProgramThread) pdfforge.PDFCreator.App.App_OnStartup: Ending PDFCreator

Hi,


I am only able to reproduce this error by deleting the printto entry from the registry for the file type.
Please check if there is a printto entry in HKEY_CLASSES_ROOT\pngfile\shell on your machine.

best regards,