1. Generating PPT and XLS in ColdFusion 9
Ajay Sathuluri
TeraTech

2. About Me Senior Web/Database Engineer, Instructor
Certified ColdFusion Developer
Microsoft Certified Solution Developer
10+ years with ColdFusion
8+ years with Fusebox
Also work with SQL, Oracle, JavaScript, VB, HTML, AJAX
Server Tuning, Administration, Load Testing
Teach one-on-one and custom classes
On site and custom development
Fusebox and Process Methodology

3. What are we covering? Powerpoint generation and processing
Also PPT to PDF
Excel generation and processing
Word and PDF

4. Cfspreadsheet Manages Excel spreadsheet files
Read a sheet from a spreadsheet file and store it in:
ColdFusion spreadsheet object
query
CSV string
HTML string
Write a single sheet to:
new XLS file from a query
CSV string variable
Add a sheet to an existing XLS file

5. Spreadsheet functions
SpreadsheetMergeCells
SpreadsheetNew
SpreadsheetRead
SpreadsheetReadBinary
SpreadsheetSetActiveSheet
SpreadsheetSetActiveSheetNumber
SpreadsheetSetCellComment
SpreadsheetSetCellFormula
SpreadsheetSetCellValue
SpreadsheetSetColumnWidth
SpreadsheetSetFooter
SpreadsheetSetHeader
SpreadsheetSetRowHeight
SpreadsheetShiftColumns
SpreadsheetShiftRows
SpreadsheetWrite
SpreadsheetAddColumn
SpreadsheetAddFreezePane
SpreadsheetAddImage
SpreadsheetAddInfo
SpreadsheetAddRow
SpreadsheetAddRows
SpreadsheetAddSplitPane
SpreadsheetCreateSheet
SpreadsheetDeleteColumn
SpreadsheetDeleteColumns
SpreadsheetDeleteRow
SpreadsheetDeleteRows
SpreadsheetFormatCell
SpreadsheetFormatColumn
SpreadsheetFormatColumns
SpreadsheetFormatRow
SpreadsheetFormatRows
SpreadsheetGetCellComment
SpreadsheetGetCellFormula
SpreadsheetGetCellValue
SpreadsheetInfo

6. Spreadsheet Functions: Demo
Create with SpreadsheetNew()
Set values of cells:
SpreadsheetSetValue
Basic value
However, first time you touch this cell within Excel, it may auto-reformat. If there is an = sign at front, it will switch it to a formula
SpreadsheetSetFormula
Specify from the beginning that this cell is a formula
Demo

7. PowerPoint
CFPresentation introduced in CF8; only exported to Acrobat Connect-style flash presentations
New:
export to PPT
HTML file, generated HTML/images
read from PPT slides
Note: Saving presentation to “HTML” format really means generating a Connect-style Flash presentation

8. PowerPoint Demo: HTML to PPT
Generating HTML, just like to Browser
One slide comes from an HTML file
Demo

9. PowerPoint demo: PPT to Connect
Can take slides from a PPT file
Demo

10. cfdocument In addition to the existing functionality:
Convert Word documents and PowerPoint presentations to PDF
All versions of MS Word and MS PowerPoint from 97 to 2003 are supported
Uses OpenOffice, installed on the server
Required for DOC -> PDF
Used, but optional, for reading PPT
To install OpenOffice .
Unclear whether the QuickStarter needs to be running

11. cfdocument “format” attribute is required
Either “src” or “srcfile” for the source
“src” attribute - URL or the relative path to the web root.
The file must be in a browser-writable format such as, HTML
Not .doc file
“srcfile” attribute - Absolute path of a file that is on the server.
Specify only the absolute path, eg: "c:\documents\MyDocument.doc".
If you do not specify the filename attribute, it saves to a temp folder and opens the converted PDF in a browser.

12. Convert .doc to .pdf: DEMO
<cfdocument format="pdf“ srcfile="C:\documents\MyDocument.doc" filename="C:\documents\MyDocument.pdf"> </cfdocument>

13. Convert .ppt to .pdf: DEMO
<cfdocument format="pdf" srcfile="C:\documents\MyPresentation.ppt" filename="C:\documents\MyPresentation.pdf"> </cfdocument>

14. cfdocument: Gotcha
In the Adobe CFML reference help “PERMISSIONSPASSWORD” attribute is misspelled as “permissionpasswrd”, do not copy the this attribute from Adobe CFML reference.
Adobe listed MS Word and MS PPT can be converted to PDF, but cfdocument can also convert .xls to .pdf

15. Convert .xls to .pdf: DEMO
<cfdocument format="pdf" srcfile="C:\documents\sales.xls" filename="C:\documents\sales.pdf"> </cfdocument>

16. Supported Office conversion formats
CFML Tag
OpenOffice
installation
From To
PPT
Connect Presentation
cfpresentation
optional
HTML
PDF
cfdocument
not required
Excel
cfspreadsheet
Query
In-memory Variable
In-memory variable
Word
required
From Livedocs,

17. Questions?