Exporting Data

[blizard360]

Hi Guys, I have a bit of a tough one here (at least for me and my Google skills). We were given 40-50 PDFs that had a pre-existing table on it (we weren't given the original CAD files...life isn't THAT sweet). I imported it into Cad ("PDFATTACH">"PDFIMPORT") which usually works fine, however for the table and the text inside it just imports in as lines. We ultimately want to bring the table and its data into Excel in order to make changes and then use that excel in the future to populate an actual data table in CAD. I think part of the issue is coming from the original PDF since it doesn't actually have text on it, just a picture of the text (which I found out after a straight pdf>excel import yielded gibberish). I also tried converting the lines in CAD to text but when I go to C&P into Excel, it just plops in a picture. Does anyone have any suggestions besides "start from scratch and type it all out by hand"? 

(Pictures included for your viewing pleasure) 

[pendean]

>>>... the table and the text inside it just imports in as lines...<<<
AutoCAD does not automagically create tables from PDF imports yet: may be in the future. There is nothing you can do about it today with the core program. You'll have to use 3rd party tools like this freebie (and others that cost $) for the conversion https://www.cadforum.cz/en/converting-pseudo-tables-consisting-of-lines-and-texts-to-tables-tip12830

HTH

[jrreid]

I found this that you can try. I don't have Adobe DC to test it but maybe you will and get lucky.

How to convert a PDF to Excel | Adobe Acrobat DC

https://www.adobe.com/acrobat/how-to/pdf-to-excel-xlsx-converter.html

Hope this helps you.

JRR.

[Alfred.NESWADBA]

Hi,

a PDF is not a data exchange format. It does hold very simple vector graphics like line, circle, arc, as well as text objects, as well as raster files. But it does not know anything about storage of a data-table.

For your text inside the PDF-file, when you have imported it and you have got lines, you might try command _PDFSHXTEXT (look to settings inside this command) to get the lines recognized as/converted to text, this could solve at least the line to text question. With a bit of development you can then get an AutoCAD table from the border lines and the text.

- alfred -