There's no way to convert an AI on the web to PDF, AI files depend on Illustrator. Why not just zip the files and send it by mail. And if a user want to see the file he needs Illustrator on his machine.
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Question
How to preivew or Download Adobe Illustrator Files in SharePoint 2007
The marketing department of our company is interested in creating a library of Adobe Illustrator files in their SharePoint site in our Intranet.
We ran into a problem that hours of Google searches have proven fruitless:
Here is the gist of the problem:
1. AI file is uploaded to a SharePoint Picture Library
2. A user clicks to download that file
3. SharePoint presents the dialog to save a PDF (not AI)
What is going on that SharePoint is able to automatically convert the file to a PDF? I've searched Google, Adobe's website, and Microsoft's knowledgebase and have not found a good answer to explain this behavior.
Ultimately we are trying to build a library that is user-friendly, that users can simply click on the AI file and download it for sending our graphic files to a professional printing vendor.
There IS a way to download the AI file but that involves several steps and is not user friendly or intuitive: The user must...
1. click on the check under the picture
2. Access the Actions Menu -> Download
3. click "set advanced download options"
4. finally click download
Not very elegant
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Answers
To MsShadow: The picture library has a mix of JPEGs and AI files. The user wants to use a Picture LIbrary, but I'll test the Doc Library later just for good measure.
To therealteune: The gist of the problem is somewhere in the chain of things, the system is converting the AI doc to a PDF, and I'm sure it's server-side, and not client side, because I've tested downloading the AI file from a system with AI installed and one without. I'll suggest the zipping idea, but it would be more elegant to be able to have the actual AI doc there.
Here are some updates as well as responses:
to MsShadow: I tested out both types of libraries, and whether I put the AI file in a Picture Library, or a Document Library, upon clicking on the AI file in the respective libraries, the user is asked to save a PDF or cancel.
Ripin: yes, IE does think that AI files are PDF... is there a way around this or a way to tell the system not to present the download as a PDF?
You can present Ai files with other icon, you can open them in illustartor to map that file type to illustrator.
To open files in Illustrator by default then change user machine AI filetype mapping to illustrator.
Go to Explorer (not Internet Explorer) (or My Computer)
Under the Tools menu choose Folder Options
Click on the File Types tab
Find the file extension you want to modify (say Ai for Illustrator)
Click on the Advanced Button
In the Edit File Type deselect Browse in same window for the Edit or Open actions (or all of them if you prefer)
Then modify DOCICON file in sharepoint server. (%COMMONPROGRAMFILES%\micr
In the ByExtension; section of the Docicon.xml file, add an entry for the .ai file name extension.
Mapping Key="ai" Value="NameofIconFile.gif"
For example, if the name of the .gif file is ai.gif, add the following line:
Mapping Key="ai" Value="ai.gif" EditText="Adobe illustrator" OpenControl="" /;
That will force windows open that file to program that is mapped on that machine to that file type. If program not found then it will ask to save.
Ripin, your idea looks the most promising. I did run across modifying the DOCICON file for creating icon sets in my searching of the Internet for a solution... but I didn't realize that would affect how the link will launch in SharePoint as well.
I'm in the middle of rebuilding our DEV SharePoint server, and will test it on there later today or tomorrow. I'll keep you all posted on what I find out.
OK. After modifying DOCICON.XML here are some things I've found (no solution yet!)
- the actual path to the DOCICON.XML is under the TEMPLATE folder of the 12 hive (%COMMONPROGRAMFILES%\micr
osoft shared\web server extensions\12\TEMPLATE\XML ) - the path to store icon files associated with a file type is in the IMAGES folder of the TEMPLATE Folder (%COMMONPROGRAMFILES%\micr
osoft shared\web server extensions\12\TEMPLATE\IMA GES) - after adding <Mapping Key="ai" Value="icai.gif" EditText="Adobe Illustrator" OpenControl=""/> to the XML file under the ByExtension node and running IISreset, this effectively changed the ICON within SharePoint, BUT AI files still default to PDF.
- I removed the "SharePoint.OpenDocuments"
value and ran IISReset again, but still get the same problem.
I also set up a plane-jane IIS website with a simple HTML file that has a link to a test AI file. Upon clicking on this file, the browser prompts me to download the file as an AI file, and not PDF...
There is still something happening in SharePoint that auto-converts AI files to PDFs. I know, based on various forums, that AI files are just PDFs with additional meta data for authoring/editing, and wonder why SharePoint treats this differently than a regular html web page in IIS.
I don't believe I mentioned this before: I'm running MOSS 2007 Enterprise with latest service packs...
<MAPPING OpenControl="SharePoint.Op
ok... I can finally put this matter to rest! Here's what I ended up doing:
- I followed Ripin's advice to get SharePoint to display an sweet-looking AI icon for Ai files.
- I had to change the MIME type for .AI files in IIS from application/postscript to application/octet-stream
(http://www.microsoft.com/technet/pr odtechnol/ WindowsSer ver2003/Li brary/IIS/ cd72c0dc-c 5b8-42e4-9 6c2-b3c656 f99ead.msp x?mfr=true ) - IISreset and all was good!
What got me really confused was that I was testing my "plane-jane" html site on an older Windows 2003 server I built more than 5 years ago. This server apparently had the AI file MIME type already set to application/octet-stream. My SharePoint server (built mid 2008) had Ai file MIME type set to application/postscript.
One
Anyone have any additional thoughts before I call this the final solution?
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by: MsShadowPosted on 2009-04-24 at 00:45:46ID: 24222625
Does it show the same behavior when you place the AI files in a document library instead of a picture library?