PDF Creator – Multiple worksheets to multiple files in two folders

I received a question from a reader of my site about how to adapt my Print Multiple Worksheets to Multiple PDF Files article so that it would also print each file to two separate directories.

There are at least a couple of ways to do this, but the one that I worked up is shown below:

Sub PrintToPDF_DualCopy()
    'Author: Ken Puls (www.excelguru.ca)
    'Macro Purpose: Print multiple worksheets to individual files and write the output to two locations
    '  (Download from http://sourceforge.net/projects/pdfcreator/)
    '  Designed for early bind, set reference to PDFCreator

    Dim pdfjob As PDFCreator.clsPDFCreator
    Dim sPDFName As String
    Dim sPDFPath As String
    Dim sPDFPath1 As String
    Dim sPDFPath2 As String
    Dim lSheet As Long
    Dim lLoop As Long
    Dim bRestart As Boolean

    'Set your PDF Paths here:
    sPDFPath1 = ThisWorkbook.Path & Application.PathSeparator
    sPDFPath2 = "F:\Some Folder\"

    'Activate error handling and turn off screen updates
    On Error GoTo EarlyExit
    Application.ScreenUpdating = False

    Set pdfjob = New PDFCreator.clsPDFCreator

    'Check if PDFCreator is already (or still) running and attempt to kill the process if so
    Do
        bRestart = False
        Set pdfjob = New PDFCreator.clsPDFCreator

        If pdfjob.cStart("/NoProcessingAtStartup") = False Then
        'PDF Creator is already running.  Kill the existing process
            Shell "taskkill /f /im PDFCreator.exe", vbHide
            DoEvents
            Set pdfjob = Nothing
            bRestart = True
        End If
    Loop Until bRestart = False

    For lSheet = 1 To ActiveWorkbook.Sheets.Count
        'Check if worksheet is empty and skip if so
        If Not IsEmpty(Worksheets(lSheet).UsedRange) Then
            sPDFName = "testPDF" & Sheets(lSheet).Name
            With pdfjob
               '/// Change the output file name here! ///
                .cOption("UseAutosave") = 1
                .cOption("UseAutosaveDirectory") = 1
                .cOption("AutosaveFormat") = 0 ' 0 = PDF
                .cOption("AutosaveFilename") = sPDFName
                .cClearCache
            End With

            For lLoop = 1 To 2
                If lLoop = 1 Then
                    sPDFPath = sPDFPath1
                Else
                    sPDFPath = sPDFPath2
                End If
                pdfjob.cOption("AutosaveDirectory") = sPDFPath

                '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 & "*.pdf") = sPDFName & ".pdf"
            Next lLoop
        End If
    Next lSheet

Cleanup:
    'Release objects and terminate PDFCreator
    On Error Resume Next
    pdfjob.cClose
    Set pdfjob = Nothing
    Shell "taskkill /f /im PDFCreator.exe", vbHide
    On Error GoTo 0
    Application.ScreenUpdating = True
    Exit Sub

EarlyExit:
    'Inform user of error, and go to cleanup section
    MsgBox "There was an error encountered.  PDFCreator has" & vbCrLf & _
        "has been terminated.  Please try again.", _
    vbCritical + vbOKOnly, "Error"
    Resume Cleanup
End Sub

Some important things to notice about this code:

• It was developed using PDFCreator 0.9.3, and may not work with 0.9.5 as some of the Object Model in that version is different.
• You need to set a reference to the PDFCreator library, as this routine is developed to work with an Early Bind

In addition, this routine incorporates some different methods from my original routines posted on my site, including:

• It attempts to shut down PDFCreator if it is already running when the routine is launched, so that it can create a fresh copy
• It uses a different method to test for completion.  Namely, it tests when the file shows up at the target location, rather than testing to see when the PDF queue is empty.  (This has inherently been more reliable than the method I originally used.)

Now, I just need to find the time to update all the existing articles on my site, and start playing with version 0.9.5 for Vista...

Note:  PDFCreator 0.9.3 doesn't work on Vista, and the Taskkill method may not work on XP Home.