CatLady [] wrote:
> Li Chen wrote:
>> Hi guys,
>>
>> I just wonder if anyone out there ever uses PDF::Writer to create a PDF 
>> file from a MS word document file. I can only create a PDF file if the 
>> file is in plain text format.
>>
>> Thanks,
>>
>> Li
> 
> You might want have to write some sort of a macro or script file which 
> opens up word, dumps the document to text so you can do your conversion.
> 
> An easier approach would be to use a PDF print driver
> 

There are some filters available on most open-source platforms that will
do a *fair* job of this. OpenOffice.org will also do a *fair* to
*acceptable* job of this. For the most part, though, making high-quality
PDFs of a Word document requires either buying software for a Windows
platform or using the Adobe service that converts documents on the web.

Creating high-quality PDFs from *original* documents is much easier in
the open source world. TeX and all its trappings, DVI, PostScript,
Scribus, Inkscape, etc. offer excellent PDF output. The tricky part is
getting the information from the Word document.