CHM which is Microsoft’s Complied HTML Help file is widely used universal format now a days.These files are very useful for documenting about a program.Every program has a help in CHM format which can be easily understand by the readers.Now converting CHM to PDF will be very useful to even share documents and for reading on mobile devices as well.
To Convert CHM PDF we require:
- a CHM help file of any program
- a free PDF Printer
- a free PDF Joiner
dopdf:Free PDF Printer used here is dopdf which converts any text file into PDF.after installing dopdf make sure it is set as default printer,
PDFTK Builder:Free PDF Joiner here used is Free PDFTK builder which can join multiple PDF files and as well as it can used to split PDF file.
let’s proceed to conversion
Now for this I considered help file of Microsoft’s Calculator since its available to all users of Windows ,you can choose any help file as you can.
Now open help file of calculator by Start>Programs>Accessories>Calculator
Calculator>Help>Help Topics help file will open
You have to understand the items are group into main topics in the help file on the left pane , we generally read by selecting items on the left pane.there are two parts here on left pane calculator and using the help viewer.Now first select calculator and in options above select print in Print Topics select Print the selected heading and all the subtopics ,click ok.
Now in the Print Window select dopdf as printer ,select all as page range and click apply,print.Now pdf aks to give a filename for it name it and save it by browsing through in your desired directory .I gave it name as helpfile1.Now after successful conversion document open in your PDF reader .I have got 8 page without any loss of images or fonts very prettily .
Now in the help file of calculator print the second topic using the help viewer as PDF following the above procedure name it and save it as helpfile2.I have got 4 pages for this .Now we are going to combine these to help PDF files into a single PDF file with PDFTK Builder.
Now open the PDFTK Builder and in the Source PDF Documents add two help files helpfile1,helpfile2 by ADD ,now click Save As and give PDF file name as calculator.Open calculator PDF file you can see 8+4 =12 pages of PDF document formed.
This is the way to convert CHM to PDF .The main logic here is the number of main topics on the left pane will have to be converted into PDF files and those PDF files will be joined by PDFTK builder into one.If we have only one topic in the left pane of help file then we need not to use PDFTK builder so that we have printed one file to PDF using dopdf .
If you have found any Freewares to convert CHM to PDF let me know through your. comments.
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