Configuring the PDF Document Support feature

To configure the PDF Document Support feature, you set up to use documents in PDF jobs, and you configure your PDF workflows to process documents.

The functions in RICOH ProcessDirector Plug-in for Adobe Acrobat let you set up to use documents in PDF jobs. For example, you define how to identify the documents.

The functions on the RICOH ProcessDirector Workflow page let you configure your PDF workflows to process documents. For example, you add steps that identify documents and build PDF files from the documents. Other steps let you sort, split, and group documents and pull documents from a job.

If your production PDF files are processed by programs that change the PDF data, place the steps that call those programs before the steps that identify documents or after the steps that build PDF files from the documents.

If you get unexpected results when you process a PDF 2.0 file with a step based on the IdentifyPDFDocuments step, do one of these:

  • Use the version of the RICOH ProcessDirector Plug-in for Adobe Acrobat supplied with RICOH ProcessDirector version 3.6 and above to update the control file. Remember to copy the control file to the correct location for RICOH ProcessDirector to use it.
  • Place a step based on the OptimizePDF step template in the workflow before the IdentifyPDFDocuments step.

In this section:

  1. Setting up to use documents in PDF jobs
    To use documents in PDF jobs, you define how to identify the documents, map data in the documents to RICOH ProcessDirector document properties, and add markup to the documents. Finally, you save the setup information in a RICOH ProcessDirector Plug-in for Adobe Acrobat control file.
  2. Configuring steps to identify documents in PDF files
    If you have installed the PDF Document Support feature, you can add a step in your workflows based on the IdentifyPDFDocuments step template. You specify the RICOH ProcessDirector Plug-in for Adobe Acrobat control file that contains document properties and the page grouping definitions. When RICOH ProcessDirector processes a PDF file using a workflow that includes an IdentifyPDFDocuments step, it identifies the documents in the PDF file and extracts document property values.
  3. Setting up to process sets of files containing PDF documents and data
    To process sets of files containing one or more documents in a PDF file and additional data in an auxiliary input file, you set up an input device that uses one of the batching methods for sets: Number of sets, Pages in sets, or Sets by time. Then, you set up a PDF workflow. When the IdentifyPDFDocuments step runs, it produces a single PDF job that contains all the individual documents. The step includes the additional data in the document properties file (DPF) for use by other steps in the workflow.
  4. PDF workflow to apply markup
    Although the PDF Document Support feature includes advanced functions for managing PDF jobs at a document level, you might benefit from starting with a basic PDF workflow that applies markup to a PDF file and extracts document properties.
  5. Workflow to split PDF jobs by size
    The PDF Document Support feature includes step templates that you can use to split a job into smaller jobs so that, for example, they can be printed on separate printers.
  6. Workflow to split PDF jobs by document property
    Instead of splitting a PDF job into several jobs using job size as the criterion, you might want to use the value of a document property, such as country or sales region. In this scenario, you use a step based on the GroupDocuments step template instead of on the SplitDocuments step template. Each group of documents becomes a separate child job.
  7. Using steps that change the PDF data in a workflow
    RICOH ProcessDirector offers Ultimate Impostrip® Connect and PitStop Connect features that can be used to change the contents of a PDF file during workflow processing.

Related information:

Workflow to print jobs created in the Documents table
Setting up to pull documents from a job
Parent topic: Configuring document processing features