Print Multiple Mail App Emails as One PDF

[Jannis_Gundermann@adobeforums.com]

I'm pretty late to the topic but am having the same issue like Keith.
Using the latest Mail.app i need to compile roughly 1900 emails that are collected in a 'Smart Folder' into a sinlge PDF file.

Keith, if you are still reading this, I would love to hear how you ended up solving this.

Jannis

[keithdvo@adobeforums.com]

I have never solved the problem. In fact, I'm having a hard time with Acrobat on OS X because I always lose the links when I try to print something to the Acrobat PDF printer. Sigh....

Keith

[Aandi_Inston@adobeforums.com]

>. In fact, I'm having a hard time with Acrobat on OS X because I always lose the links when I try to print something to the Acrobat PDF printer.

You will always lose links when you print to the PDF printer.

Aandi Inston

[Jon Bessant]

OK - here's what I did recently ..

Highlighted the relevant emails
go File / Save Attachments /
Saved into a specific folder
(Acrobat 9) - Create PDF Portfolio
Added files to make one document
(you could also choose PDF Package in a similar way for Acrobat 8)

Jon

[keithdvo@adobeforums.com]

Yeah; I should know that. I have been so used to printing from Windows where I had the PDF button in Word. Annoying. I wish I could keep the links live.

Keith

[keithdvo@adobeforums.com]

Jon,

Thank you, but I'm not trying to save attachments; I'm trying to save the emails themselves. If I highlight them and click File, Save Attachments is greyed out.

Still, maybe I can export them and grab them from within Acrobat and see if the links remain. I'll try that. Till now, I've just been printing to the Acrobat PDF which as I've noted, removes the links.

Thank you!

Keith

[keithdvo@adobeforums.com]

DRAT! That was a huge failure: I exported five test messages and saved them as an .rtf. I then went to Create PDF From FIle, but got an error that says "Acrobat could not open "test.rtf" because it is not a supported file type or because the file has been damaged…."

Dang.

[pjonesCET@adobeforums.com]

You have to save as a Word .doc file not .rtf. then open the files in in word and convert to pdf's from with in Word2008

[keithdvo@adobeforums.com]

Thank you for that suggestion. Sadly (?), I don't own Word. I decided when I bought my Mac this past May that I was going to leave behind as much as possible the World of Windows. (Now, I still like Windows for some things—I even installed Vista x64 with Fusion—I just wanted my Mac to be Mac, as it were.)

What I originally did was highlight a group of emails and hit Command-P. I'm trying to remember now what happened: Doing it that way lost either the links, or attachments; I can't recall. And moving them to TextEdit did the opposit: kept what was lost, and lost what was kept. I should try again.

Bottom line, I don't want to use Mail.app's archive. I just want to move the emails from Mail.app to a searchable PDF.

Perhaps the Perfect is the enemy of the Good here. I miss the Acrobat Email-to-PDF in Outlook for Windows. Sigh....

Keith

[pjonesCET@adobeforums.com]

[email]keithdvo@adobeforums.com[/email] wrote:

> Thank you for that suggestion. Sadly (?), I don't own Word. I decided when I bought my Mac this past May that I was going to leave behind as much as possible the World of Windows. (Now, I still like Windows for some things—I even installed Vista x64 with Fusion—I just wanted my Mac to be Mac, as it were.)
>
> What I originally did was highlight a group of emails and hit Command-P. I'm trying to remember now what happened: Doing it that way lost either the links, or attachments; I can't recall. And moving them to TextEdit did the opposit: kept what was lost, and lost what was kept. I should try again.
>
> Bottom line, I don't want to use Mail.app's archive. I just want to move the emails from Mail.app to a searchable PDF.
>
> Perhaps the Perfect is the enemy of the Good here. I miss the Acrobat Email-to-PDF in Outlook for Windows. Sigh....
>
> Keith

There are other programs that can open word documents besides Word.

NeoOffice is one and Open Office is another.

[keithdvo@adobeforums.com]

@Jon

Maybe some day they'll be more integrated on OS X and Mac's native apps (though I sometimes wonder if I should switch).

@pjones

True enough, but for some reason, I've really resisted those. I'm not sure why, but I do thank you for pointing them out to me. I noticed that OpenOffice just came out with a new OS X version, so perhaps I'll have to look more closely.

Keith

[Jannis_Gundermann@adobeforums.com]

It's a shame that this is not simpler but I have found a—less than perfect but reliable—way to do what I needed.

Using Mail Scripts 2.8.3 (Works on 10.5.5/ Latest version Mail.app) and can be downloaded here:
<http://www.versiontracker.com/dyn/moreinfo/macosx/16217>

I use the "Archive Messages" Script to export all the messages I need, unfortuantely I cannot select the ones I want but rather have to select a whole folder/label/tag. After selecting the appropriate label (in my case) to export, I am presented with a range of options such as:
-MBOX file
-Simple Txt (.txt file)
-RTF that includes LINKS and IMAGES/Attachments (.rtf file)
The RTF can but does not have to include attachments, and there is also the choice to export the full header of each email or just the 'standard' mail.app view aka. 'minimal headers'

You also get the option to output each email into individual .rtf/.txt files or combine them into 1 file—which is what I prefer.

While I have also run into the problem of not being able to open the .rtf in Acrobat, I have word—maybe the free opensource offices also work with .rtf?—and then i can output it to pdf from there.

I really hope Apple would make this simpler but for now this is the best I have got.
I hope it helps you guys too.

J

[Jannis_Gundermann@adobeforums.com]

A quick follow up still, if I simply double click to open the aforementioned .rtf file and then "Print" then use the Mac native "Save to/as PDF.." button the file converts to a PDF that does in fact retain links!

The only problem I have encountered with that is that in the PDF there are very very 'generous' margins applied to the document and the type size increases which results in a less than efficient use of PDF pages.

Nevertheless it does work.

J.

[Michael Kazlow]

Acrobat has a setting to create links from urls. This won't embed the
links, but it will recognize urls and let you click to launch them. This
should rid you some of the pain of not creating links from emails. For
me I don't see the issue nor the need to create pdfs from emails. I use
a text only email program. Emails are displayed as plain text and saved
as plain text the way the old gods of internet intended them to be :-)

Mike

[Jon Bessant]

> Perhaps the Perfect is the enemy of the Good here. I miss the Acrobat Email-to-PDF in Outlook for Windows. Sigh....

and don't forget Lotus Notes ;-)

There are many other features under Outlook/Acrobat 9 such as automatic
embedding of the search index, combine, append, auto archive and above
all, keeping the rich content intact ...

Jon

[keithdvo@adobeforums.com]

@Mike
Thank you! Under Preferences: General, I do have "Create links from URLs" checked. As far as I can tell, it only works when the URL is explicitly written; it doesn't work on links that are embedded (as you note). Sadly, it is exactly this type of link I wish to capture. Argh!

I now worship the new gods of the internet; they're all about rich media! ;-)

@Jannis
Thanks for the suggestion. I'm definitely intrigued. A couple of the complaints on the site you note worry me. Have you had any problems with the script(s)? I'm especially interested to see that it works with attachments.

If I ever learn AppleScript, I wonder if I could tweak it for better folder and message selection.

Regards,

Keith

[pjonesCET@adobeforums.com]

Sadly Mike is one of those folks That thinks he can get around in a Model-T just as well as a Modern up to date car. :-)

[Michael Kazlow]

Nope, not a model T, plain text email is really much faster than html. I
can always load html in a browser if i need it. Html mail programs are
Hummers, I drive the Ferrari.

I don't have to worry about beacons, speed of rendition, executable
code. I have no hidden html urls. All urls are quite visible. If I were
to print to pdf, the urls would show up. I will never have to worry
about a link in a email, that looks like it sending you one place, when
it is sending you eleswhere. Phishing mails are always very very obvious.

I view html mail as slow and clunky. Mailsmith's searching of folders of
email is unsurpassed in flexibility. The content of most email is just
as easily communicated in plain text as html. The only advantage will be
unicode. However, I rarely see unicode in the html emails that are sent
my way. Give me ascii email, send all the formatted content as pdf
attachments.

....Mike