Generating .DOC Reports from a Linux Server and PHP System

AI Thread Summary
Generating .DOC files from a PHP-based web accounting system on a Linux server presents challenges due to the closed nature of the .DOC format. There are no direct PHP libraries for this conversion, and reverse engineering the format is not practical. However, alternatives like PDF and OpenOffice's OASIS (XML-based) formats can be generated easily. Tools such as FPDF and PDFlib are recommended for creating PDFs. RTF format is another viable option, as RTF files can be renamed with a .DOC extension for compatibility with Microsoft Word. For more complex requirements, setting up a Windows environment, either physical or virtual, may be necessary to utilize Java libraries or Python scripts that can interact with Word documents.
Omid
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We have a linux server and some win clients.
Our webbased accounting system is soppused to make reports in different formats like .DOC.
The system is written in PHP. How can we generate that format?
 
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I did a google search to see if there was a program in php that could do the conversion but there are none. Doc is a closed format and unless your willing to put in time to reverse engineer the format then no. PDFs on the other hand can be generated on the fly as well as the Oasis (xml based) format used in Openoffice.

http://www.fpdf.org/

If your not going to sell this software your better off using: pdflib

http://www.pdflib.com/

http://www.pdflib.com/products/pdflib/download/601/PDFlib-6.0.1p1-Linux.tar.gz
 
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(I'm not familiar enough with PHP to see if these are directly applicable to you.)

Is .RTF acceptable?
http://php9.bloghi.com/2002/07/23/using-php-for-rich-text-format-rtf-external.html
http://www.phpbuilder.com/annotate/message.php3?id=1011981

http://www.wlug.org.nz/RTF says "You can also give an RTF file a ".DOC" extension and then MicrosoftWindows users will be able to transparently open it in MicrosoftWord, blissfully unaware what format the file is actually in."

Here's a start:
http://jakarta.apache.org/poi/hwpf/index.html

The following need a Windows machine. Maybe you could set up a local Windows machine (real or virtual?) that could serve your linux servers with the required files.

http://schmidt.devlib.org/java/libraries-word.html points to:
http://www.java400.de/Javactpe.htm
"Java Bean Word Processing. Freeware. Read and write Word 97 and 2000 files. Needs a driver that runs only under Windows."

Here's something in Python
http://www.win32com.de/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=173&Itemid=130
more from
http://www.win32com.de/index.php?option=com_content&task=category§ionid=7&id=86&Itemid=130
 
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