How many times a day do you want to send a document as an attachment to an email, but you’d rather send a PDF than a DOCX, an XLSX or a PPTX? It’s much safer to attach the document as a PDF.

But the work involved is huge, as you would need to open each Office document and save it as a PDF. Either that, or each time you create or edit an Office document you would have been required to also save it as a PDF as well.

Saving documents as a PDF so that they can be attached to an email is a really common task for many. 

The Send As, PDF command in MacroView DMF and MacroView Message provides a way to dramatically reduce the keystrokes required to do this Save-as-PDF-and-Attach operation for a Microsoft Office document that is stored in SharePoint.

By ‘dramatically’ I mean cut out at least 70% of the keystrokes that would otherwise be required if you did not have the command. The MacroView Send As, PDF command also reduces elapsed time, risk of error and storage overheads.

Let’s run through the steps required if you do NOT have MacroView Send As, PDF :
1) Locate to the document library, document set or folder in SharePoint
2) Click to open the Office document – say into Microsoft Word.
3) Click File, Save As
4) Select PDF from the file type dropdown
5) Click OK
6) Switch into Outlook
7) Create a new message
8) Click to insert Attachment
9) Locate to the relevant area in SharePoint or Windows
10) Select the saved PDF and click OK .

If you have MacroView DMF or MacroView Message and the Save As, PDF command installed, the process is MUCH quicker and easier:
1) Locate to the document library, document set or folder in SharePoint
2) Right-click on the Office document
3) Choose Send As, PDF from the right-click menu.

Send As, PDF converts the Office document into a PDF dynamically, creates a new Outlook email and inserts the PDF as an attachment. That’s 7 fewer steps or a reduction of 70% in user actions – more if you need to remove the temporary PDF from a Windows folder.

Send As, PDF will also re-instate the original filename, complete with any characters that have been automatically removed by MacroView because they are illegal in SharePoint file names.

Similar savings are available through use of the Copy As, PDF command that is also available for MacroView DMF and MacroView Message.

Watch this video of Send As, PDF in action.

For more information about Send As, PDF and other ways MacroView DMF and MacroView Message can dramatically increase your productivity when managing documents and emails in SharePoint, contact MacroView Solutions .